The Army has formally began fielding its latest fight helmet, the Subsequent-Era Built-in Head Safety System, to troopers in close-combat formations, the service introduced Tuesday.
In response to service officers, the NG-IHPS will present troopers with “elevated ballistic and fragmentation safety” in a 40% lighter package deal in comparison with the sooner Built-in Head Safety System, which was first fielded in 2018 to exchange the Superior Fight Helmet and Enhanced Fight Helmet.
The primary NG-IHPS models had been fielded to round 2,000 troopers assigned to the first Brigade Fight Staff, 82nd Airborne Division, on Monday, the service stated. Army Instances was first to report information of the fielding.
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The sooner-generation IHPS weighed simply three kilos and offered added safety in opposition to pistol rounds and fragmentation in comparison with earlier fight helmets, nevertheless it required a further two-pound ballistic applique to supply full safety in opposition to small-arms hearth. The NG-IHPS will purportedly supply that subsequent stage of safety with out the extra weight.
“That is world-leading rifle risk safety we’re offering to our troopers,” Maj. Matthew Nulk, the assistant program supervisor of the Program Government Workplace Soldier’s Head Safety Staff, stated within the Tuesday press launch.
Chatting with Army Instances, Head Safety Staff lead engineer Alex de Groot attributed enhanced safety of the NG-IHPS to the usage of light-weight polyethylene as a substitute of inflexible and rigid Kevlar materials within the helmet’s development, with the previous dispersing vitality on impression moderately than shattering just like the latter.
The Army has been flaunting a next-gen polyethylene helmet since a minimum of 2018, when researchers confirmed off a prototype that claimed to supply rifle safety in an astonishingly light-weight 3.25-pound package deal.
The total NG-IHPS setup consists of a novel retention and suspension system, a helmet cowl, and a night-vision bracket that is designed to combine with a separate mandible protector (which is able to primarily be fielded to troopers in mounted formations), together with listening to safety.
“The boltless retention system and night-vision gadget bracket mount on with out compromising the helmet’s structural integrity, thus rising safety,” de Groot stated within the launch.
The helmet’s night-vision bracket can also be designed to combine seamlessly with futuristic heads-up shows just like the Enhanced Night time Imaginative and prescient Goggle-Binocular and Built-in Visible Augmentation System that the Army plans to discipline broadly within the coming years, the service stated.
“This fielding marks important progress for soldier protecting gear because it equips troopers with safety in opposition to related battlefield threats, and the revolutionary helmet design is a purpose-built platform for integration now, and with future soldier-enabling gadgets,” Lt. Col. Ken Elgort, product supervisor for Soldier Protecting Tools, stated within the launch.
How the NG-IHPS will maintain up in fight, nevertheless, stays to be seen. In response to the fiscal 2023 evaluation of the system from the Pentagon’s chief weapons tester, “extra testing” is required “to evaluate NG-IHPS safety in comparison with legacy helmets and to evaluate the diploma of potential accidents to warfighters from penetrating threats” to the helmet.
The Army plans on equipping the 82nd Airborne’s 2nd and third Brigade Fight Groups with the NG-IHPS this quarter and fielding the helmet throughout close-combat formations “over the subsequent three years,” the service stated.
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