Using Discrete Event Simulation to Define Requirements for Autonomous Aeromedical Evacuation Vehicles

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scitech_cooperider2025autonomy.pdf (1.65 MB)
Author(s)
Cooperider, William S.
Bermudez Rivera, Reina
Vallejos, Jeremy
Pingree, George
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Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering
The Daniel Guggenheim School of Aeronautics was established in 1931, with a name change in 1962 to the School of Aerospace Engineering
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https://hdl.handle.net/1853/77083
Abstract
When a casualty is sustained in combat it is both a tactical necessity and moral imperative to exhaust all resources to back-haul the wounded service member from their point of injury to a higher surgical care facility with the specified purpose of saving their life; a mission architecture known as Medical Evacuation Operations (MEDEVAC). Presently, the MEDEVAC system relies on the ground unit to stabilize a casualty, move them to a secured pick-up site, and successfully communicate to command the casualty’s status, location, and requirement for an evacuation. Subsequently, Command must assess the levels of multi-domain contestation in the battle space against acceptable levels of risk before committing a large, loud, piloted craft with an onboard medical provider to the casualty’s location. Executing MEDEVAC in a Large Scale Combat Operations (LSCO) environment will require a paradigm shift in communicating, evacuating, and caring for casualties. This paper examines the development of a Discrete Event Simulation (DES) to show the capability spectrum of MEDEVAC unmanned aerial vehicles in LSCO. These vehicles, named the Versatile Autonomous Lifesaver in a Combat Rescue Environment (VALCRE), represent potential future capabilities and have adjustable characteristics. Our technical approach was to architect a lifesaving environment, abstract casualty health monitoring and autonomous onboard medical care, introduce stochasticity into the present MEDEVAC mission architecture to contest all domains in the battle space, and measure the performance of VALCRE concepts in LSCO to inform future vehicle requirements.
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2025-01
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