Posted by John Keller

WRIGHT PATTERSON AFB, Ohio, 16 Feb. 2012. U.S. Air Force and Navy combat aircraft pilots needed helmet-mounted military night vision cueing and display systems for fighter pilots operating high-performance aircraft at night. They found their solution from Vision Systems International LLC in San Jose, Calif.

Officials of the U.S. Air Force Air Armament Center (ASC) activity at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, awarded Vision Systems a $19.8 million contract Tuesday for night vision cueing and display standard field night vision devices for the Air Force and Navy. ASC''s main headquarters are at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla.

Vision Systems, a team of Rockwell Collins in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and Elbit Systems of America in Fort Worth, Texas, designs advanced helmet mounted display systems (HMDS) to give jet fighter pilots look-and-shoot capability. Among the Vision Systems flagship products is the Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing System (JHMCS) for Air Force F-15 and F-16 jet fighters, as well as the Navy F/A-18 fighter-bomber.

JHMCS, operational in more than 20 countries, enables combat pilots to aim onboard weapons and sensors against enemy targets while performing high-G aircraft maneuvers.

The Vision Systems night vision cueing and display (NVCD) systems expands the capability and effectiveness of JHMCS by providing the user with image-intensified night vision merged with standard helmet-mounted-display symbology and line-of-sight (LOS) tracking.

Among the Vision systems night-vision products is the NVCD QuadEye, which provides the fighter pilot with a 100-by-40-degree field of view and debrief camera. The system uses four 16-millimeter night vision image-intensifier tubes to provide a night vision display with standard helmet-mounted display symbology. NVCD QuadEye is interchangeable with the Vision Systems JHMCS day module, and provides fighter pilots with line-of-sight targeting during night missions.

Vision Systems also provides the NVCD ANVIS, which inserts cueing symbology into standard 40-degree field of view ANVIS-9/F4949 night-vision goggles.

For more information contact Vision Systems International online at www.vsi-hmcs.com, or the Air Force Air Armament Center at www.eglin.af.mil.