Combat Safety and Survivability Combining survivability and safety techniques to address crew safety in combat

In Summer 2013 the UK Supreme Court confirmed the existence of MOD's Duty of Care to its personnel in action. This was carefully expressed not as a limitation on operations but was aimed at the provision of suitable equipment along with the justification of the design and protection decisions taken in its procurement and maintenance, and in its operation.  In response to this ruling the UK Naval Authority Group, under the authority of the Defence Maritime Regulator and the Royal Navy Survivability Strategy, developed the principles of Combat Safety, creating a survivability and personnel protection process that parallels traditional safety management, delivering an auditable record of the requirements development, design, construction and maintenance of survivable vessels and crew protection arrangements, as well as significantly improved guidance to warfighters on the survivability and personnel protection aspects of the ships in which they serve. The paper discusses the introduction of and background to the UK MOD’s developing Combat Safety process, which is aimed at minimising the risk to life of personnel in combat arising from hostile action. It discusses the relationship between Combat Safety, “traditional” safety management and survivability. The processes developed to manage Combat Safety for new construction and legacy vessels are discussed, and the development and content of the Combat Safety Summary are discussed, Finally the future RN development programme for Combat Safety is outlined.