The Captive Air Amphibious Transporter (CAAT) is a 1:5 scaleFaleiro, Shawn.
DARPA Captive Air Amphibious Transporters
''GadgetGain'', 11 August 2012. Retrieved: 3 September 2012. tracked

amphibious vehicle An amphibious vehicle (or simply amphibian), is a vehicle that is a means of transport viable on land as well as on or under water. Amphibious vehicles include amphibious bicycles, ATVs, cars, buses, trucks, railway vehicles, combat vehicles an ...

prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototyp ...

being developed by

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adv ...

. It drives on the water with air-filled pontoons attached to the tracks, and is intended to demonstrate how to transport standard 20- or 40-foot containersAlvarez, Edgar.
DARPA's Captive Air Amphibious Transporter can drive on water, help during disaster relief
''

Engadget ''Engadget'' ( ) is a multilingual technology blog network with daily coverage of gadgets and consumer electronics. ''Engadget'' manages ten blogs four of which are written in English and six have international versions with independent editori ...

'', 11 August 2012. Retrieved: 3 September 2012. from ordinary

container ship A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...

s to

shore A shore or a shoreline is the fringe of land at the edge of a large body of water, such as an ocean, sea, or lake. In physical oceanography, a shore is the wider fringe that is geologically modified by the action of the body of water past a ...

without using a

harbor A harbor (American English), harbour (British English; see spelling differences), or haven is a sheltered body of water where ships, boats, and barges can be docked. The term ''harbor'' is often used interchangeably with ''port'', which is a ...

. DARPA is investigating its usefulness in

disaster A disaster is a serious problem occurring over a short or long period of time that causes widespread human, material, economic or environmental loss which exceeds the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources ...

s so that commercial

shipping Freight transport, also referred as ''Freight Forwarding'', is the physical process of transporting Commodity, commodities and merchandise goods and cargo. The term shipping originally referred to transport by sea but in American English, it h ...

can relieve military ships to focus on military tasks. The CAAT is one of four elements in the Tactically Expandable Maritime Platform (TEMP) program; the others being a containerized living quarter, a stabilized crane, and an

unmanned An uncrewed vehicle or unmanned vehicle is a vehicle without a person on board. Uncrewed vehicles can either be under telerobotic control—remote controlled or remote guided vehicles—or they can be autonomously controlled—autonomous vehicl ...

powered parachute A powered parachute, often abbreviated PPC, and also called a motorized parachute or paraplane, is a type of aircraft that consists of a parafoil with a motor and wheels. The FAA defines a powered parachute as ''a powered aircraft a flexible o ...

delivering containers by air.DARPA develops technologies for aiding disaster relief
" ''

'', 26 June 2012. Retrieved: 3 September 2012.Littlefield, Scott.
Tactically Expandable Maritime Platform (TEMP)
" ''

''. Retrieved: 3 September 2012.

UHAC

The

Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory The United States Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory (MCWL) was established in 1995, at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia. The organization was originally known as the Commandant's Warfighting Laboratory. The battle lab is part of Combat Dev ...

is using the CAAT's air-filled track system in its Ultra Heavy-Lift Amphibious Connector (UHAC) concept. The objective is to develop a new amphibious connector to transport U.S. Marine Corps vehicles from ship to shore in heavier loads and over shore obstacles. A half-scale demonstrator was used during

RIMPAC RIMPAC, the Rim of the Pacific Exercise, is the world's largest international maritime warfare exercise. RIMPAC is held biennially during June and July of even-numbered years from Honolulu, Hawaii, with the exception of 2020 where it was held i ...

2014, where it was loaded with an Internally Transportable Vehicle, launched from the

USS Rushmore (LSD-47) USS ''Rushmore'' (LSD-47) is a of the United States Navy. She was the second navy ship to be named for the Mount Rushmore National Memorial in the Black Hills of South Dakota. She is the seventh ship in her class of dock landing ships and th ...

, then paddled to shore. The demonstrator was 42 ft (13 m) long, 26 ft (8 m) wide, 17 ft (5 m) high, weighed 38 tons, and traveled at 4-5 knots on water; the hull was made of aluminum, with a small pilothouse mounted on the bow. Using track feet fitted with dense air-impregnated foam blocks make it buoyant in the water and propel it on land, allowing it to traverse through mud, sand, and marshland when ashore. This made the demonstrator's ground pressure about 1

PSI Psi, PSI or Ψ may refer to: Alphabetic letters * Psi (Greek) (Ψ, ψ), the 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet * Psi (Cyrillic) (Ѱ, ѱ), letter of the early Cyrillic alphabet, adopted from Greek Arts and entertainment * "Psi" as an abbreviatio ...

, compared to 9.7 PSI for the

Amphibious Assault Vehicle The Assault Amphibious Vehicle (AAV)—official designation AAVP-7A1 (formerly known as Landing Vehicle, Tracked, Personnel-7 abbr. LVTP-7)—is a fully tracked amphibious vehicle, amphibious landing vehicle manufactured by BAE Systems Land & Ar ...

. The full-size UHAC is planned to be long and up to high. The UHAC is primarily aimed at potentially replacing the

Landing Craft Air Cushion The Landing Craft Air Cushion (LCAC) is a class of air-cushioned landing craft (hovercraft) used by the United States Navy and the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF). They transport weapons systems, equipment, cargo and personnel from shi ...

hovercraft, but it could also supplement it and replace the

Landing Craft Utility A Landing Craft Utility (LCU) is a type of boat used by amphibious forces to transport equipment and troops to the shore. They are capable of transporting tracked or wheeled vehicles and troops from amphibious assault ships to beachheads or piers ...

. Compared to the LCAC, the UHAC is planned to have a heavier payload of 150 tons (standard) to 190 tons (overload) compared to 65 tons, a longer range of compared to , has the advantage of using its tracks to move inland from the beach and over

sea wall A seawall (or sea wall) is a form of coastal defense constructed where the sea, and associated coastal processes, impact directly upon the landforms of the coast. The purpose of a seawall is to protect areas of human habitation, conservation ...

s, and is estimated to cost less than half as much to build and maintain per unit; the LCAC has a faster water speed of over 30 knots compared to 20 knots for the UHAC, and a smaller area of compared to . The UHAC would be faster on water than the AAV and could even transport them to get closer to shore, or carry up to three

M1 Abrams The M1 Abrams is a third-generation American main battle tank designed by Chrysler Defense (now General Dynamics Land Systems) and named for General Creighton Abrams. Conceived for modern armored ground warfare and now one of the heaviest ta ...

tanks. A production version would be survivable with a lower profile, armor, and armament. The concept for the UHAC began in 2008 with the goal to design an amphibious vehicle with low PSI. The

Office of Naval Research The Office of Naval Research (ONR) is an organization within the United States Department of the Navy responsible for the science and technology programs of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps. Established by Congress in 1946, its mission is to plan ...

accepted the design from Navatek, and three prototypes have been constructed since (a one-fifth scale model, a one-quarter scale model, and the half-scale model). Currently, the UHAC effort is a collaborative effort between the U.S. ONR and the Singapore Ministry of Defense Science and Technology department. No decision has been made on taking the final steps necessary to produce the full-scale version.Marines Test Heavy Duty Landing Craft Prototype at RIMPAC
- News.USNI.org, 16 July 2014

References

''This article incorporates work from https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=84b2ca1784dda86b61f606897097e3cc&tab=core&_cview=0, which is in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...

as it is a work of the United States Army.''

External links

Meet the Marines’ Ultra Heavy-lift Amphibious Connector
{{Use dmy dates, date=June 2017 Tracked amphibious vehicles Humanitarian aid DARPA vehicles DARPA projects Experimental vehicles