Special operators to deploy wearable to keep tabs on vitals, help warn about chemical threats

By the end of the year some American special operations forces (SOF) will begin fielding new wearable tech designed to keep a real-time eye on their vitals as well as integrate with systems designed to warn command posts should the operator be exposed to dangerous gases or chemicals, according to an official with the SOF office dedicated to hazardous materials.

“We’ve been able to integrate with some of those sensors that warfighters are able to carry around and do that chemical sensing,” Steve Carrig, the product lead for strategic acquisitions at the Joint Program Executive Office for Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defense’s (JPEO-CBRND) SOF office, told Breaking Defense in a recent interview. “So you’re not only using the the physiological market signs that you’re detecting, you know, heat, stress, fatigue, etc, but then you’re combining it with that environmental monitor as a separate data stream to really inform the subject matter experts that are there in a tactical environment to say, ‘I’ve got this sensor over here going off with this individual and their heart rates spiked. We’ve got to pay attention.’”

The device, which is currently in the prototyping stages and being developed by LifeLens Technologies, is part of what the Army calls the Wearable All-hazard Remote-monitoring Program (WARP), led by the JPEO-CBRND. It’s the “first DOD-led physiological monitoring device to be fielded to the joint force,” the Army said in a release last month.

Read more at Breaking Defense