Summer 2004, Vol. 1, Issue 1

Emergency room: no waiting

Saving lives in battle zones depends on speed. Swift treatment offers even the most severely injured combatants a better chance of returning home to their families. Click image for larger view.

Soldiers wounded in battle can land on an operating table within minutes, thanks to Y‑12's new Future Medical Shelter System. The highly mobile, rapid-setup, 400-ft2 surgical suite provides tables, equipment, lights and supplies along with some protection against gunfire and nuclear, biological and chemical contamination.

Moreover, the system could potentially morph into a command-and-control center, operations base or similar unit for homeland-defense response actions.

Project manager Duane Bias, mechanical engineer Lee Bzorgi (recipient of two patents for the system), and electrical engineer Terry Brown directed the shelter's $7 million design and fabrication for the U.S. Army.

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