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also providing for the exploration and quantication of the M&S uncertainty space. As stated earlier, the navy has a robust testing program that includes equipment shock qualication, FSST, TSST, and surro -gate ship testing for the validation of ship survivability design. By necessity, these tests must be performed on the as-built hardware. e results of these tests, therefore, aren?t known until after the completion of ship construction. If deciencies are discovered, the acquisition program suers signicant cost and schedule impacts. Rigorous M&S during the design stage promises to signicantly reduce the potential for discovering deciencies during physical testing. Additionally, as condence is gained in M&S predictions of ship damage and post-hit operability, the navy can consider reducing the scope of physical testing?testing that has signi -cant cost and requires many months during the ship construction process. More thorough exploitation of M&S through ?virtual test -ing? has the potential to further reduce acquisition cost as well as risk by providing virtual test results continuously through the design cycle. Great strides have been made in M&S for survivability assess -ment, particularly in the last 20 years. While additional R&D is required to mature M&S to the point where virtual testing can be performed with condence, sucient validation exists to dem-onstrate the potential and illuminate the limitations requiring additional focus. M&S is continuing to expand as a major ele -ment of the design of ships for survivability and tools like NESM are already providing important design assessments early enough to reduce costly deciencies late in the ship acquisition program. rough continuing basic and applied research programs (such as CREATE), the potential to reduce and/or replace physical test -ing with M&S has clearly been demonstrated and will continue to be matured. Coupled with the ongoing advances in HPC, M&S is becoming a prominent element of the ship design and assess -ment process for survivability . MTDr. E. Thomas Moyer is a senior research scientist and technical consultant at the Naval Surface Warfare Center/Carderock Division. en-USJuly 2012 en-US en-USwww.sname.org/sname/mt Texas A&M