It was only a sixth of a mile at the blistering pace of 3 mph, but the Autonomous Land Vehicle — nicknamed ALV — set a record 25 years ago on a test track outside Denver.
No vehicle of its kind — driverless, with a computer system that could plan where it was headed and avoid obstacles based on what it “saw” — had ever traveled so far and so fast.
The unmanned vehicles that took center stage last week at the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International conference in Denver can deliver so much more.
But ALV helped to get them where they are.
To acknowledge that, a 25th anniversary commemoration for ALV was part of the conference.
Engineer Jim Lowrie was there in Waterton Canyon when ALV set the record with the work for the U.S. Army being done by Lockheed Martin’s predecessor, Martin Marietta.
Lowrie is still there, as Lockheed’s director of autonomous systems.
“Martin Marietta had this conviction that this would be a major market element in the future, and that has become true,” Lowrie said.
While Lockheed has had a hand in many unmanned spacecraft, “the unmanned ground-vehicle world has taken a while,” Lowrie said.
ALV took a lot of computer power back then — more than $1 million. Computer equipment today does that work for a few hundred bucks.
“The exciting technology has come together recently for the first time: the computer power, sensor technology, and at low-enough cost so it is affordable,” Lowrie said.
A quarter-century later, Lockheed drew on what it learned from ALV for its automated convoy program. Vehicles equipped with the Convoy Active Safety Technology, or CAST, follow each other.
The first vehicle can operate autonomously or by remote control, increasing the safety of soldiers from ambushes, improvised explosive devices and rear-end collisions.
The technology can be installed in any vehicle and takes up about as much room as a bag of groceries.
Although CAST was developed at Lockheed’s facilities in Dallas, some of the testing was done at Fort Carson, south of Colorado Springs. Lowrie said vehicles equipped with it are headed to Afghanistan next year.
Lt. Gen. Rick Lynch, who last year became chief of the Army Installation Management Command, is impatient about getting the robotic vehicles to the battle zone.
Lynch, who led the 3rd Infantry Division in Iraq, said during the unmanned vehicle conference that the technology is ready, so “let’s get it out where the soldiers can use it.”
Ann Schrader: 303-954-1967 or aschrader@denverpost.com
