Path Planning for Mine Countermeasures Command and Control

The future success of Navy-Marine Corps operations in the extended littoral battlespace will depend critically on organic mine countermeasure capabilities. A battlegroup commander will require tools to rapidly detect, classify, and identify mines and form a tactical picture of mined areas, so a decision can be made to punch through the minefield, avoid it, or wait for dedicated mine countermeasures forces to clear it. We introduce here a command and control framework for mine countermeasures based on probabilistic classification and multicriteria path planning under uncertainty. Data from probabilistic mine classifiers can be used by a path planning tool to generate information comparing the relative utility and risk associated with different routes through a minefield. We are developing a dynamic path planning tool that can be adjusted to manage safety versus time to objective, constructing alternate paths of varying time and risk through a minefield. It will evaluate alternative routes while searching for low risk paths. A risk management framework can be used to describe the relative values of such different factors as risk versus time to objective, giving the capability to balance path safety against other mission objectives. We are also adding visualization techniques to display mines with uncertain locations and highlight alternative routes through minefields and obstacles. Our goal is to present a commander the most useful tactical picture of mined areas for decision-making.