Kylie Ball
Kylie Ball is a lead systems engineer at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia Division, supporting the Columbia-class submarine program. She began her career as a contractor in 2012 after earning a Bachelor of Science in nuclear engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Early roles included supporting aircraft carrier habitability modification packages and leading design teams.
In 2015, Ball transitioned to the electric plant test facility for the Columbia-class submarine, first as a contractor and later as a Department of the Navy civilian. Since 2018, she has served as lead systems engineer for test readiness certification, ensuring technical requirements are satisfied and documented before testing begins. She also supports the program’s technical director as deputy, helping resolve engineering challenges and enhance test facility performance.
Guillermo Juarez
Guillermo Juarez is a test engineer at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia Division, where he supports electric plant and propulsion system testing for the Columbia-class submarine. Juarez began his career in the U.S. Navy in 2001, serving as an electronics technician aboard fast-attack submarines. He separated from the Navy in 2009 and earned a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Temple University in 2014.
He began his civilian government service at U.S. Army Futures Command, developing and testing systems to ensure reliable position, navigation and timing in contested environments. He earned a Level III DAWIA certification in engineering in 2019 and a Master of Science in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Delaware in 2022.
GJ: This topic was introduced to us by one of our NPS professors, Mr. Howard Pace, and it immediately stood out as a challenge with significant implications for cost savings and operational readiness. We were struck by the fact that multi-million-dollar weapons systems, along with highly trained flight crews, are often tasked with delivering small or lightweight spare parts to ships at sea. Not only is this an inefficient use of high-value assets, but in cases where helicopters are unavailable, ships may need to return to port just to retrieve parts. This results in unnecessary downtime and removes ships from their operational areas, which reduces overall fleet effectiveness.
As civilian employees who support and test complex Navy systems, we’re drawn to the idea of delivering capability through increased efficiency. In our current roles, we regularly see how logistical delays and resource constraints impact system availability and mission readiness. That perspective made us especially interested in tackling this challenge. Finding smarter, more cost-effective solutions allows the Navy to enhance warfighter capability while staying within budget, an essential priority given the scale and complexity of modern naval operations.
GJ: As a result of our study, we have realized that UAV platforms can play a key role in supplementing or even replacing traditional crewed aircraft for certain logistics missions. Their ability to operate autonomously, at lower cost, and with less logistical overhead (i.e., no crew, lower procurement and maintenance costs) makes them well-suited for distributed operations. In regions like INDOPACOM, where the area of responsibility spans large distances and operations are becoming more decentralized, UAVs can help distribute assets and capabilities more effectively. We believe UAVs offer the ability to provide sustained resupply options that don’t rely on crewed platforms or port visits.
KB: I think that UAVs are really on the precipice of becoming a major technological tool for the services, though there is still room for improvement. Through our research, UAVs certainly seem to offer advantages in responsiveness, cost, and mission effectiveness by way of environmental impact, while freeing up more traditional delivery methods for other missions that cannot be accomplished by drone. On the other hand, quite a few of the UAV options available today lack either sufficient ability to carry heavier payloads, which would enable a more diverse mission portfolio, or require longer travel times to complete a mission, given their generally slower speeds when compared to something like a helicopter. That’s not to say we won’t be seeing improvements in either of those areas, but right now, the choice of how and when to use UAVs comes down to the priority of the mission – is it speed, cost, or availability?
GJ: Thinking through the acquisition strategy early in our research helped us understand and ensure that our proposed solution remained grounded in real-world constraints, such as available funding pathways and relevant technology readiness levels (TRL). By aligning our approach with the Middle Tier Acquisition pathway within the Adaptive Acquisition Framework, we focused on leveraging existing commercial UAV platforms with high TRL to accelerate prototyping, testing, and fielding. This alignment supported the operational relevance of our research by using proven platforms, ensuring that our proposed UAV logistics system is technically feasible and realistically within existing defense acquisition processes.
KB: I learned a lot from our class in Cost Benefit Analysis, but also Acquisition of Defense Systems. Both classes, were really informative when it came to looking at this type of research. The other big factor is the mentorship we received from our professors, which made finding advisors really easy. Professors Tick and Pace have been incredible resources and being able to benefit from their experience and knowledge helped us a lot, and our research was more thorough because of it.
