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Original Date: 07/08/2002
Revision Date: 01/18/2007
Best Practice : Simulation Accreditation Review Panel/Verification, Validation, and Accreditation Process
The Simulation Accreditation Review Panel manages the Directorate for Missile and Surface Launchers’ verification, validation, and accreditation process by providing independent technical oversight of verification and validation for modeling and simulation activities and documentation.
The Directorate for Missile and Surface Launchers (PEO TSC-M/L) recognized that implementing a robust process for Verification, Validation, and Accreditation (VV&A) of Modeling and Simulation (M&S) tools used to develop STANDARD Missile (SM) variants was critical to ensuring the product’s effectiveness. This was judged particularly important given two established trends: 1) the increasing dependence on M&S, rather than expensive live testing, and 2) the increasing complexity and interdependence of future systems. Accordingly, a VV&A process was defined for PEO TSC-M/L that matched VV&A activities to the development lifecycle from conceptual design and design reviews to developmental and operational tests through production and fielding. The process is administrated by the Simulation Accreditation Review Panel (SARP), which includes representatives from the PEO TSC-M/L, Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) as the Technical Direction Agent, Commander Operational Test and Evaluation Force, Navy laboratories Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Dahlgren and Naval Air Warfare Center (NAWC) China Lake, two major defense contractors (Lockheed Martin and Raytheon), and cognizant mission Program Offices.
The SM family is designed and developed using computer-based models and simulations. M&S tools are used throughout the lifecycle to perform trade-off studies to determine product requirements and specifications. The SARP was established to administer VV&A for the M&S. The SARP provides an independent, technical oversight of the VV&A process by defining plans, procedures, and responsibilities of various agents. It also verifies, validates, records, and accredits the M&S tools developed under the VV&A process. Prior to this formal accreditation process, the verification and validation activities were informal, subjective, and often undocumented. Simulation results could vary, and resources were expended to resolve differences. Also, subject matter experts were not always involved as development proceeded. The current Simulation Management Plan (SMP) was approved in 1999, and has been used as a guide for other Navy program VV&A approaches. This VV&A approach was used as the guide for the Navy Area Theater Ballistic Missile Defense (TBMD) Program, Navy Theater Wide (NTW) M&S Plan, NTW Accreditation Process Plan, and AEGIS Accreditation process. With the current SARP approach, all verification and validation activities are conducted according to defined plans, procedures, and responsibilities. Many benefits resulted from the VV&A process including:
Cost reduction for fielding working systems by early detection of design errors through cross checking simulation results between contractors
Cost savings from reduced actual SM flight tests replaced by trusted simulations
Elimination of potential flight test failures due to a more formal and structured technical oversight
M&S provided a solid basis for making development, manufacturing, and deployment decisions
Ensured consistency of simulation test conditions and results among participating organizations
Established a corporate memory including lessons learned for the SM systems by the formal VV&A efforts
By establishing the SARP, the PEO TSC-M/L effectively used M&S tools to detect shortcomings in different phases of the lifecycles of various missile systems, and applied corrective actions to mitigate program risks.
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