Desert Is the Mother of Invention as U.S. Troops Adapt to Harsh Conditions : Military: The unforgiving environment spawns new products and clever uses for old ones.
Heat-resistant chocolate bars. High-visibility aircraft landing lights. New cooling vests for tank crews. Bedsheets and bungee cords used to shield aircraft canopies from the desert sun.
That wide array of innovations may seem disparate to some onlookers, but all these items have something in common: They are products of Operation Desert Shield.
Although the U.S. deployment in Saudi Arabia hasn’t yet resulted in fighting, it has spawned a host of inventions and improvisations to help U.S. troops cope with the unforgiving desert environment and the hardships of extended duty far from home.
In the 4 1/2 months since Iraq invaded Kuwait, military laboratories, civilian suppliers and those in the field have come up with a myriad of new products--and new uses for old ones.
Soldiers are using condoms to keep sand out of gun barrels, for example, and stretching panty hose over air intakes to serve as makeshift sand filters.
What’s more, Pentagon planners have accelerated the development or purchase of dozens of other articles especially applicable to desert conditions, including new cooling systems for tank crews, prefabricated shelters and a new, lightweight chemical-protection suit for pilots.
Invariably, the inventions have been spawned by necessity.
When U.S. troops began arriving in early August, their biggest enemies were the heat and unrelenting sun. Not surprisingly, Army brass cast their eyes on the “clamshelter,” a commercially available vinyl-and-aluminum building whose doors open and shut like clams.
The units, measuring 76 feet by 190 feet, can house two CH-47 helicopters with rotor blades intact. The Army Aviation Systems Command quickly contracted with Clamshell Buildings Inc. of Santa Barbara for 44 of them.
Also as a result of the intense desert heat, the Army’s Natick Labs in Massachusetts has speeded up development of a new “microclimate cooling system,” which cycles convection-cooled air from the turbine of a tank through flexible tubing to a vest worn by crewmen.
Harvey Keene, a Natick Labs spokesman, says the system has been tested on Marines in Utah and passed with flying colors.
“Guys could operate buttoned up in tanks in heavy overgarments without any significant degradation in performance,” Keene asserts.
Similarly, the Air Force has adopted what it calls the “multi-man intermittent cooling system”--a cooling vest for flight-line mechanics wearing chemical protection suits. The vests are cooled by large air conditioners usually used for aircraft electronics systems.
The intense desert heat also created a demand for a new, heat-resistant candy bar that would melt in GIs’ mouths, but not in their pockets under the 140-degree temperatures that were common in Saudi Arabia during early August and September.
In response, the Hershey Food Corp. of Bethlehem, Pa., developed a new candy bar and has sent 144,000 of them to the Army for “combat-testing” in the desert. Hershey has declined to discuss the secret formula that keeps its candy bar from melting.
“Other manufacturers produced high-temperature chocolate that was tasteless and waxy-textured,” says the Army’s Keene. “We wanted to give them familiar food in familiar form--something they were used to at home.”
Besides the heat, loose sand and blowing dust have been big environmental problems for the military in the Saudi desert. And, in the absence of any new products, U.S. troops have responded by jury-rigging solutions.
For example, Army and Marine Corps airplane mechanics have applied tape and epoxy resin to helicopter blades to slow abrasion from sand--often prolonging the life of rotor blades as much as four-fold.
The Air Force brought scores of rechargeable household “Dustbuster” vacuum cleaners to its maintenance hangars to help lift persistent dust from aircraft engines, electronics bays and cockpits.
Loose sand and dust create special problems for pilots, who tend to become disoriented and lose track of the horizon in the featureless desert terrain.
As a result, many of the services have speeded up testing of products designed to deal with these problems. The Army and Marines have accelerated testing of a navigation light system that uses portable, high-visibility neon runway lights. It permits establishment of landing strips or helipads on short notice in undeveloped areas.
Alfred T. Schmidt, founder of Litebeams of Burbank, manufacturer of the devices, says the units now are being tested in Saudi Arabia. Litebeams also is experimenting with an infra-red version that is invisible except to those wearing night-vision goggles.
Some Army helicopter pilots have used their own money to buy small Loran navigation devices. The Army and Air Force have placed an emergency order for 1,000 of the hand-held navigation units. The devices have proven invaluable because of the lack of landmarks in the desert.
Despite all the ingenuity, U.S. officials say that, largely because of the Pentagon’s cumbersome procurement process, only a handful of the truly new devices will likely be available in time to use in the gulf. Most will involve modifications of existing gear.
Under Defense Department rules, the Pentagon must offer competitive bidding on almost all new items it buys.
At the same time, hundreds of other ideas--Pentagon officials call them “unsolicited proposals”--come in over the transom weekly and are unlikely to be produced.
They include pocket air conditioners, sweat-absorbing uniforms, a flying tank, and water-cooled underwear--”just like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck wear at Disney World,” one official says.
