LEXIOS used at Northern Edge 2015

Northrop Grumman’s Live, Virtual and Constructive Experimentation, Integration and Operations Suite (LEXIOS) was deployed during US military joint training exercise Northern Edge 2015, the company announced on 7 August.

The air-to-air training exercise included virtual participants at air force bases and sites across the US. Live and virtual participants were linked by the LEXIOS, allowing virtual aircraft operated by actual aircrew members to participate in the same airspace alongside their live counterparts via networked simulators.

Constructive – simulated forces in a simulated environment – components were also used to augment the battlespace to make the training as realistic as possible.

Northrop Grumman developed LEXIOS under the US Air Force's Distributed Mission Operations Network (DMON) programme. It enables dissimilar aircraft platforms located across the globe to seamlessly interoperate and train together in a realistic virtual environment.

Capt. Matthew Mendenhall, chief of command and control operations, US Air Force 353rd Combat Training Squadron, said: ‘Northern Edge was the largest LVC integration seen to date in any of the services and the first exercise to completely integrate the various elements. For the first time from a command and control, and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance standpoint, the virtual, live and constructive assets interacted at an efficient level and proved they can work and talk to each other consistently and securely.’

Martin J. Amen, director, satellite and network operations, Northrop Grumman Information Systems, said: ‘Many 'firsts' were achieved during this critical, large-force warfighter training, which involved multiple sites and complex missions. These included the first integration of virtual Mobility Air Forces and Combat Air Forces aircrews supporting live flight operations and their first operational training event via the distributed mission operations network.’

Among the scenarios carried out, 14 fighter aircraft were virtually operated from different air bases along with one conventional bomber, two mobility transport aircraft, one airborne warning and control system and one reconnaissance aircraft. Virtual and live participants were able to interact with each other in various phases of combat employment to maximise the training's effectiveness in the exercise.

LVC training allows quality training to be achieved at a lower cost, which is a major boon to military forces. 

Col. Stephen Platt, the Northern Edge deployed forces commander, said: ‘LVC is one of the few realistic options we have going forward in our resource-constrained future. It gives us options to do things we either don't have forces for or the capabilities to execute today. LVC is a window into the future of what our forces are going to face. We are growing and maturing rapidly in our LVC capabilities, which increase the value our warriors get through LVC.’