A utility terrain automobile journey previous the bay and out to a barrier island reveals simply how expansive the 129-mile shoreline restoration mission has change into.
Col. Robert Bartlow, the chief of the Natural Disaster Recovery Division throughout the Air Force Civil Engineer Center, and his crew had been tasked with precisely how to use the Florida coast’s powdery seashores to their benefit.
“The natural environment provides that first line of defense against storms,” he stated.
Included in that first line of protection shall be a salt marsh enforcement, a built-out shoreline, a protecting oyster reef and strengthened sand dunes.
Walking towards the sand dunes, Bartlow joked about being in engineering college by no means considering he’d be working with a pure atmosphere.
“It’s not something we traditionally do in Air Force civil engineering,” he stated. Now, maneuvering round sea oats (the coastal vegetation that dot the world), he defined they’re “the glue that holds these dunes together.”
“When a storm comes through and the storm surge comes in, having these dunes built up provides a natural barrier against that storm surge … and protects the base that sits on the other side,” he stated.
Going past bodily measures, the Defense Department requested Air Force engineers to develop new expertise that helps forecast threats from future storms. Lt. Nicholas Cap, the chief of innovation throughout the Natural Disaster Recovery Division, confirmed off via a digital actuality headset what they developed.
The expertise, generally known as the base’s “digital twin,” aggregates each planning and design element of the rebuild and permits engineers to use digital and augmented actuality to put together for challenges earlier than they happen.
Cap is in a position to work together with the brand new hangers, which can home F-35 fighter jets subsequent yr.
“I can now look and see, OK, we know the storm is going to be a Category 3. … Let’s run it through the base on the digital twin and see, OK, these facilities are able to withstand that,” he stated. “Instead of being reactive, it allows us to be proactive to future threats.”
Watkins stated the Air Force plans to use what it learns from Tyndall to assist set up greatest practices for fortifying nonmilitary buildings alongside the Florida coast.
“I certainly hope that what we do here and what we learn here can be scaled and can be shared,” Watkins stated. “There’s a lot of pressure to be critical of what we do and make sure that we’re doing it in the right way … so that we can share that with other communities, and other other installations around the coastline.”
