Naval Oceanographers Win International Humanitarian Award

STENNIS SPACE CENTER, Miss. (NNS) -- The Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command (NAVMETOCCOM) has been named a 2013 Computerworld Honors Laureate and will receive the award at the black-tie Awards Ceremony June 3 in Washington, D.C.

NAVMETOCCOM received the award for a modeling capability developed by Naval oceanographers at Stennis Space Center that predicts the likelihood of pirate attacks.

IDG's Computerworld Honors Program selected NAVMETOCCOM as a 2013 Laureate in the field of Safety and Security for its development of the Pirate Attack Risk Surface (PARS). The Honors Program, founded in 1988, recognizes organizations and individuals who have used information technology to advance public welfare, benefit society and business, and change the world for the better.

"The men and women of Naval Operational Oceanography take great pride in this honor," said Rear Adm. Brian Brown, commander, Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command. "Naval Operational Oceanography is a critical partner across the range of Department of Defense operations, and the development of PARS is one more way that we use our knowledge of the environment to ensure the safety and security of our operational forces and freedom of navigation on the high seas."

The PARS model produces a forecast of shipping vulnerability due to piracy at a certain latitude, longitude, and time.

A few short months before Somali pirates hijacked the U.S.-flagged MV Maersk Alabama in 2009, NAVMETOCCOM operators were asked to assist in the fight against piracy, which had been on the rise in the Somali Basin due to government instability in the region. Pirate attacks are a threat to the United States' national security and foreign policy, and they impact maritime safety, disrupt shipping and ultimately cost the world's economy billions of dollars annually.

Within two weeks, the command had developed the framework of the first-generation Piracy Performance Surface (PPS) model, which produced maps of probability of attack based on how environmental conditions influenced pirate small boat operations.

The success of the PPS model led to development of a more advanced anti-piracy model, the award-winning Pirate Attack Risk Surface (PARS). While the first-generation PPS primarily focused on environmental factors, PARS combines shipping information, environmental data, pirate locations, pirate operating procedures, and predicted pirate behaviors into a cohesive forecasting environment.

"PARS is groundbreaking," said Rear Adm. Brown. "This is the only known Navy product that, instead of treating environmental data separately, fuses it with multidisciplinary information within a single model."

Computerworld judges evaluated the humanitarian benefits and measurable results of applying technology to meet a specific social or business need. NAVMETOCCOM's case study was selected from more than 700 nominations to become one of 268 Laureates from 29 countries.

NAVMETOCCOM, headquartered at Stennis Space Center, has approximately 2,500 globally distributed military and civilian members who provide tactical and strategic support to all areas of Naval warfare. Naval Operational Oceanography consists of the operationally-applied sciences of oceanography, meteorology, hydrography, and precise time and astrometry.

Founded by International Data Group (IDG) in 1988, The Computerworld Honors Program is governed by the not-for-profit Computerworld Information Technology Awards Foundation. Computerworld Honors is the longest running global program to honor individuals and organizations that use information technology to promote positive social, economic and educational change. Additional information about the program and a Global Archive of past Laureate case studies, as well as oral histories of Leadership Award recipients can be found at the Computerworld Honors website.


For more news from Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command, visit www.navy.mil/local/cnmoc/.