S52B-07
Geophysics, Remote Sensing, and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) Integrated Field Exercise 2014
Friday, 18 December 2015: 11:50
305 (Moscone South)
Aviva J Sussman1, Gordon Macleod2, Peter Labak2, Gregor Malich2, Aled Prys Rowlands2, Julia Craven-Jones3, Jerry J Sweeney4, Massimo Chiappini5 and George Tuckwell6, (1)Los Alamos National Laboratory, Geophysics Group, Los Alamos, NM, United States, (2)Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization, Vienna, Austria, (3)Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM, United States, (4)Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA, United States, (5)National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology, Rome, Italy, (6)RSK, Helsby, United Kingdom
Abstract:
The Integrated Field Exercise of 2014 (IFE14) was an event held in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (with concurrent activities in Austria) that tested the operational and technical capabilities of an on-site inspection (OSI) within the CTBT verification regime. During an OSI, up to 40 international inspectors will search an area for evidence of a nuclear explosion. Over 250 experts from ~50 countries were involved in IFE14 (the largest simulation of a real OSI to date) and worked from a number of different directions, such as the Exercise Management and Control Teams (which executed the scenario in which the exercise was played) and those participants performing as members of the Inspection Team (IT). One of the main objectives of IFE14 was to test and integrate Treaty allowed inspection techniques, including a number of geophysical and remote sensing methods. In order to develop a scenario in which the simulated exercise could be carried out, suites of physical features in the IFE14 inspection area were designed and engineered by the Scenario Task Force (STF) that the IT could detect by applying the geophysical and remote sensing inspection technologies, in addition to other techniques allowed by the CTBT. For example, in preparation for IFE14, the STF modeled a seismic triggering event that was provided to the IT to prompt them to detect and localize aftershocks in the vicinity of a possible explosion. Similarly, the STF planted shallow targets such as borehole casings and pipes for detection using other geophysical methods. In addition, airborne technologies, which included multi-spectral imaging, were deployed such that the IT could identify freshly exposed surfaces, imported materials, and other areas that had been subject to modification. This presentation will introduce the CTBT and OSI, explain the IFE14 in terms of the goals specific to geophysical and remote sensing methods, and show how both the preparation for and execution of IFE14 meet those goals.
