News Stories

  • June

    USACE Marks 250 Years with Pivotal Support to the Army’s Birthday

    As the U.S. Army celebrated its 250th anniversary June 14 with a birthday festival and parade in the nation's capital, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was hard at work behind the scenes and on the logistical front lines. In a powerful intersection of history and engineering excellence, USACE’s contributions helped ensure parade success while also symbolizing its own 250th anniversary of building and defending the nation.
  • May

    USACE Navigation mission critical to Armed Forces’ strategic readiness

    When the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) needs to move over 1,000 trucks, trailers, and tons of equipment for a large training exercise, they rely on the cost-effectiveness and convenience of the nation’s waterways.
  • The Corps Environment – Spring 2025 edition now available

    The Spring 2025 edition of The Corps Environment is now available! This publication highlights how the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is turning environmental challenges into mission-ready solutions. Content in this issue includes ongoing projects and initiatives from across the Army environmental community that are leveraging environmental stewardship as a force multiplier — enhancing military readiness, strengthening strategic partnerships and supporting community well-being.
  • USACE Completes Two-Week Regional Power Mission Exercise, Prepares for Upcoming Hurricane Season

    The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) successfully concluded a two-week Regional Power Mission Exercise on May 16, enhancing its readiness to provide critical temporary emergency power in the wake of a major disaster.
  • U.S. Engineering Team Assesses Colón, Panama’s Infrastructure Challenges, Strengthening Bilateral Partnership

    A team from the U.S. Army’s 553rd Forward Engineer Support Team-Advance (FEST-A) drove around important parts of the city of Colón, Panama, surveying the stormwater and wastewater systems on May 13, 2025. The survey was designed to find ways to bolster the ongoing partnership between the United States and Panama while addressing one of Panama’s largest city’s long-standing infrastructure issues.
  • OPTIC: Transforming Mission Planning with Safety, Efficiency, and Innovation

    The proliferation of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in civil works, emergency response, and military applications is the primary driver for development of the Operator’s Tool for Information Collection (OPTIC). Designed to meet operational needs, OPTIC leverages decades of experience to improve mission planning, operational tracking, and data-driven decisions for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE).
  • April

    What is a Sapper? 250 Years of “Badass” Engineers

    In the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the term sapper carries weight. For 250 years, sappers have served as elite combat engineers, supporting frontline infantry in every war throughout American history.
  • March

    Double Duty: Chris Stewarts’ Service in and out of Uniform

    Chris "CJ" Stewart seamlessly balances his dual roles as a federal civilian logistics management specialist and an Army Reservist. Serving within the Resource Integration Division (RID) of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Logistics Activity (ULA), Stewart's civilian duties involve assessing logistics through the Command Logistics Review Program (CLRP). Simultaneously, as a Motor Transport Operator (88M) in the Army Reserves, his military focus is also squarely on logistics. Stewart recently completed a year-long activation based in Poland, where his mission involved deterring, defending against, and potentially defeating adversarial aggression. His logistical support stretched across multiple countries, including Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Germany. During his deployment, Stewart held multiple critical command roles in addition to his regular duties, including SHARP Ambassador Program representative, Suicide Prevention Non-Commissioned Officer in Charge (NCOIC), Liaison Officer NCOIC, and Unit Movement Officer NCOIC.
  • USACE Aviation Program Office: Enhancing Efficiency and Compliance in UAS Operations

    The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Aviation Program Office (APO) plays a pivotal role in advancing crewed and uncrewed aviation missions across the organization. Established to meet the growing demands of Civil Works, Emergency Response, and Combatant Command operations, the APO serves as the central aviation authority for USACE, ensuring the safe, legal, and efficient operation of Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS).
  • February

    The Corps Environment – Winter 2025 edition now available

    The Winter 2025 edition of The Corps Environment is now available! This edition features ongoing projects and initiatives that are proactively considering the environment and influencing partnerships in support of military readiness and community well-being.

News Releases

Patented expedient protection structure impresses users

Soldiers deploy the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s  Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, full armor configuration at the Maneuver Support, Sustainment and Protection Integration Experiments 2020 (MSSPIX20).

Soldiers deploy the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, full armor configuration at the Maneuver Support, Sustainment and Protection Integration Experiments 2020 (MSSPIX20).

Interior of the 35-foot protective barrier of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment system.

Interior of the 35-foot protective barrier of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment system.

The Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, invention team poses in front of their invention. Team members include, from left, the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center-Geotechnical and Structures Laboratory’s Survivability Engineering Branch members Omar Esquilin-Mangual, team leader; Dr. Catherine Stephens; Erik Chappell; branch chief Omar Flores; Carey Price and Andrew Edwards of Edwards Design and Fabrication, not pictured.

The Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, invention team poses in front of their invention. Team members include, from left, the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center-Geotechnical and Structures Laboratory’s Survivability Engineering Branch members Omar Esquilin-Mangual, team leader; Dr. Catherine Stephens; Erik Chappell; branch chief Omar Flores; Carey Price and Andrew Edwards of Edwards Design and Fabrication, not pictured.

The U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment kit on display at the United Nations General Assembly 2019.

The U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment kit on display at the United Nations General Assembly 2019.

The basic configuration of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, on display in New York City.

The basic configuration of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, on display in New York City.

VICKSBURG, Miss. - With decades of inventions protecting Soldiers and civilians from hostile forces, the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s (ERDC) Geotechnical and Structures Laboratory (GSL) continues developing life-saving innovations as one of the seven world-class laboratories of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The latest invention, Ready Armor Protection for Instant Deployment, or RAPID, earned a U.S. patent in Sept. 2020. Led by research civil engineer Omar Esquilin-Mangual, the research team includes GSL’s Survivability Engineering Branch members Dr. Catherine Stephens, branch chief Omar G. Flores, Erik Chappell and Carey Price, along with Andrew Edwards of Edwards Design and Fabrication. The team will be recognized next year with a patent plaque presentation from ERDC’s Office of Research and Technology Transfer which processes patent applications for the center.  

Developed in 2018, RAPID is an easy-to assemble, expandable barrier offering faster protection for the Army, Department of Defense and law enforcement agencies. The invention provides protection from small arms’ fire, hostile vehicles and blast and fragmentation effects.

Favorable Assessments

Created in Huntsville, Alabama, at Edwards Design & Fabrication, Inc., RAPID has been used at the Technical Cooperation Program Contested Urban Environment (TTCP CUE 2019) challenge and for the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), both in New York City.

“Both the Soldiers and New York City Police Department were highly complementary of RAPID and expressed immediate needs for the system,” Esquilin-Mangual said.

ERDC researchers made improvements to RAPID based on Soldier and NYPD assessments, as well as from initial experimental results, before demonstrating the technology for the U.S. Army Engineer School and U.S. Military Police School at the Maneuver Support, Sustainment and Protection Integration Experiments 2020, or MSSPIX20, in August 2020. Additionally, the Department of Homeland Security has purchased RAPID for assessments and the NYPD has requested Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office support for police-specific modifications of RAPID

RAPID Advantages

RAPID is collapsible and scalable, and does not depend on heavy equipment, special tools or an electrical power source to be deployed or recovered. It is deployable and recoverable in minutes and can be tailored to provide blast and ballistic protection, to delay intrusion and to serve as Line-of-Sight Denial in urban settings. RAPID provides modular and relocation protection at least seven times faster than the most comparable system.

“RAPID set-up takes approximately one man-hour to assemble as compared to seven man-hours for a similar modular protective system (MPS) configuration or more than 70 man-hours for a sandbag wall,” Esquilin-Mangual said.

Delivered in Quadcon containers, RAPID may be transported on a palletized loading system truck providing more than 100 linear feet of protective barrier per truck.

“We designed RAPID with expediency and logistics in mind. To this end, RAPID’s shipping container is hardened and is part of the protective system thereby eliminating the need to store it elsewhere” explained Esquilin-Mangual.

Invention Inception

The idea was born in a meeting where the team was discussing the complex urban challenges for the warfighter under potential urban operations. “We knew that our current protective technologies provide the required level of protection, but they needed faster deployment times,” Esquilin-Mangual said.

“The idea was the next logical step after the MPS to provide faster protection to the Warfighter with increased flexibility,” said Stephens.

Current urban operations require coordination of construction equipment, materials and personnel, which is often intractable since these resources are limited. “In some cases, the current technologies are not used simply because they do not fit the military operational period, leaving the Soldiers vulnerable to threats,” Esquilin-Mangual said, referring to blast and fragmentation effects among others.                     

Testing Results and Plans

In late June 2020, five full-scale blast experiments were completed to evaluate RAPID. The first three experiments evaluated the system’s ability to absorb the blast without being breached or overturned. The last two experiments evaluated the system’s performance against rocket, artillery and mortar threats. The system performed as expected and was found to be suitable for providing protection within minutes in urban operations.

A vehicle-ramming test is planned for January of 2021 with expectations of having RAPID fully developed by the end of fiscal year 2021.

“RAPID can then be used to increase the warfighter’s survivability and protect key assets in the urban environment against conventional and improvised threats. With this rapidly deployable system, they will be equipped with the most effective tools to guarantee mission success,” Esquilin-Mangual concluded.


Mississippi Valley Division

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