Tony Stark, eat your heart out.
A futuristic new helmet designed by Navy engineers could allow divers to see and track everything from the above-water view of their location to diagrams to text messages -- all while underwater.
Called the Divers Augmented Vision Display, the technology allows divers to see and track all kinds of data points in a transparent heads-up-display that they can look through to observe their physical surroundings. Augmented reality technology also responds to what divers are observing in real time, placing information in front of their eyes to help them locate items and objectives.
In a news release, officials with Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City compared the effect to a "point-of-view video game display."
"By building this [heads-up display] directly inside the dive helmet instead of attaching a display on the outside, it can provide a capability similar to something from an 'Ironman' movie," Underwater Systems Development Project Engineer Dennis Gallagher said in a statement. "You have everything you visually need right there within the helmet."
This cutting-edge technology could become reality very soon. According to the release, diverse will conduct in-water simulation testing with the helmet tech this October. Expanded field testing is set to take place next year.
