The game-changing goggles made for the U.S army soldiers will enable them to look beyond combat vehicles’ walls. This will be a key addition to the soldiers’ equipment, giving an outstanding favor in terms of situational analysis and knowing enemies positioning.
The Integrated Visual Augmentation system is under development. This integrated system will benefit the close-combat forces, mounted and dismounted troops, and would aid in missions for the infantry forces. The program is developing thousands of these goggles, which will aid soldiers in better visibility in the dark, assess the corners without being exposed to enemy’s fire, and project digital maps and crucial situational data on the lenses.
IVAS goggles obtain access feeds from the omnidirectional cameras equipped on the armored vehicles. Using these goggles, a team of 6 soldiers, gathered safely in the back of a frontline infantry vehicle, can ‘see’ through the walls of the armored cars, receiving a clear analysis of the combat scene and aiding in situational awareness.
“Now guys aren’t hanging out of vehicles in dangerous situations trying to get views on what’s going on,” Sgt. Philip Bartel of the 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team told the Army.
He continued: “Leadership will be able to maneuver their elements and get view-on-target without having to leave the safety of their armored vehicles. Maneuvering elements with that kind of information will minimize casualties and will overall drastically change how we operate and increase our effectiveness on the battlefield.”
The army develops the IVAS goggles to behave in a like-wise manner to the heads-up display mounted on fighter jets. Like the HUD, IVAS goggles also project videos, maps, and night vision around the soldiers’ field of view.
The IVAS goggles give soldiers an instant view which will come in handy in the ground combats. Apart from this, soldiers won’t need to search their pockets for maps to assess the surroundings. They would now have all the data projected onto the IVAS lens while keeping a vigilant eye on the enemy’s all movements.
The new goggles could be connected with a rifle-mounted night-vision thermal imaging to project a better view of the combat scene when it’s dark.
A 2020 report on the IVAS system explains how soldiers train with the system. According to the Director, Operational Test & Environment, soldiers with IVAS can: “Enter and clear six rooms as a team in a real-world building with virtual Synthetic Training Environment targets and content using synthetic M4 airsoft rifles and trackers. Following each experiment run through, warfighters received feedback about their performance, including shots were taken, kills, and shots received. Warfighters could replay their actions as avatars in a virtual after-action review.”
The army is going all out for the IVAS system development and has asked for funds of 1.1 billion dollars to develop and equip soldiers with 40,000 IVAS system pairs. Congress, however, said of cutting the budget of this project by 20 percent. Although the reports say that Army has resolved most of the hindrance in its production works and will soon have its soldiers equipped with these modern IVAS system in field combats.