Supporting Expeditionary Aerospace Forces: Evaluation of the RAMPOD Database

Publication Date: January 2001

Publisher: RAND Corporation

Author(s): Amatzia Feinberg; Patrick Mills

Research Area: Military and defense

Type: Brief

Abstract:

In the years to come, the effectiveness of the Expeditionary Aerospace Force (EAF)--which organizes the U.S. Air Force to respond rapidly and efficiently to national security threats--will pivot largely on the support system that underlies it, termed the Agile Combat Support (ACS) system. One key component of the ACS system is the electronic countermeasure (ECM) pod system. Accordingly, this documented briefing outlines the findings of a study that assessed the utility of the Reliability, Availability, and Maintainability of Pods (RAMPOD) database as an analytical tool in support of the ECM pod system. The study found that RAMPOD, as it is currently constituted, already has significant potential for supporting ECM pod analysis, particularly in the tracking and displaying of trends for pod removal, repair times, and in-shop queue. At the same time, the study found a significant number of missing data elements that could, in aggregate, adversely affect the efficacy of the RAMPOD system. In addition, the RAMPOD data warehouse was found to contain much data that could not be readily accessed through the current web-based tool. The report concludes that qualitative and quantitative improvements to RAMPOD could dramatically enhance its effectiveness as both a strategic and an operational tool.