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DoD Plans Ambitious Video Production Schedule in 2009
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Since 2007, the DoD Corrosion Policy and Oversight Office has made education and outreach a top priority. Working with a team of communication advisors in the DoD Corrosion Forum, the Office released its first informational video and video cast, titled In Focus: The War on Corrosion. The hour-long show aims to teach the American public about corrosion as a menace to our infrastructure and pocketbooks.
A new video cast that articulates the DoD’s general corrosion prevention program was released in June of 2008. It is currently posted at www.CorrDefense.org. Another video cast explaining the law related to DoD corrosion policy was also posted at www.CorrDefense.org in February 2009.
For the past year, the DoD Corrosion Office has embarked on an ambitious plan to produce more than a dozen new video, video cast, and gaming tools to train the DoD acquisition workforce, industry corrosion technicians, and the general public.
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LeVar Burton Stars in New DoD Training Video
Production Urges Corrosion Prevention, With Lessons in Corrosion Science
By Cynthia Greenwood
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LeVar Burton |
You know him as Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge in Star Trek: The Next Generation, the eloquent Martin Luther King, Jr. in the film Ali, and the iconic Kunta Kinte in Roots, the groundbreaking TV mini-series of the late seventies. More recently, film and TV actor LeVar Burton has starred as Detective Mike Timbrook in Taken in Broad Daylight, a Lifetime Movie Network premier about a kidnapped teen who survives a harrowing six-day captivity after negotiating her own safe release.
Using his signature on-screen intensity for a didactic purpose, Burton narrates Corrosion Comprehension: Combating the Pervasive Menace, an ambitious new video aimed at educating military personnel and the public about the threat and the science of corrosion. The Defense Department’s Corrosion Policy and Oversight Office retained Bruno White Entertainment, a rich-media production company, to create the video. (See DoD Plans Ambitious Video Production Schedule.)
Urging Prevention, Along With Some Meaty Lessons in Corrosion Science
As the video opens, an eye-popping montage illustrates the everyday threat of corrosion and its ubiquitous effect on the cars we drive and the bridges we traverse.
“Nature has a way of letting us know that we are not the most powerful force on earth,” Burton’s narrative begins, thus taking us on a journey that probes the seemingly obvious, but little-understood phenomenon called corrosion. Because corrosion is a naturally occurring phenomenon, it is a “silent, pervasive, and unrelenting scourge that destroys the items we count on every day,” Burton cautions.
At the outset, Burton emphasizes the enormous costs that are incurred by government, industry, and citizens when metals and materials deteriorate according to the laws of physical science. He explores the impacts of corrosion on our physical infrastructure and federal, state, and local budgets. The best solution, Burton suggests, is to prevent corrosion from attacking our assets and infrastructure by treating them with products designed to resist corrosion.
Burton explains, “All too frequently, decisions are made to avoid the initial cost of corrosion prevention. This results in even more money being spent in maintenance over the lifetime of the product.” Advancing a key message, Burton notes that investing in corrosion prevention instead of waiting to treat, repair, or replace materials can reduce the cost of corrosion by 40 percent.
The Fundamentals of Corrosion
Because corrosion is a naturally occurring phenomenon, it is a “silent, pervasive, and unrelenting scourge that destroys the items we count on every day,” cautions LeVar Burton in Corrosion Comprehension: Combating the Pervasive Menace.
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The video features interviews with experts who emphasize the need for education and a better grasp of the science of corrosion. Ever wondered about the chemical roots of corrosion? Viewers get lessons in the mechanism of the electrochemical cell, its components, and how their interaction results in various kinds of material and structural degradation.
After reviewing the fundamentals, Burton takes us into the laboratory to witness corrosion at work. Clues about the characteristics and properties of materials, which affect why and how fast they corrode, are explored. The video then highlights the 12 common types of corrosion, which include general corrosion, galvanic corrosion, pitting, crevice corrosion, intergranular corrosion, stress corrosion cracking, hydrogen embrittlement, de-alloying, corrosion fatigue, flow-assisted corrosion, fretting, and stray current corrosion.
Burton also reviews useful ways of detecting and predicting corrosion, as well as managing it in a variety of ways. He discusses how treatments such as paints, coatings, and corrosion prevention compounds can protect surfaces. He also explores other means of mitigation, such as sheltering and cathodic protection.
Plans for Distribution
The DoD Corrosion Policy and Oversight Office has posted Corrosion Comprehension: Combating the Pervasive Menace for public download on the CorrDefense Web site.
“This video was designed to follow Corrosion in Action, an older and widely known motion picture about corrosion, which features Francis LaQue, a renowned authority on marine corrosion who died in 1988.”
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“This video was designed to follow Corrosion in Action, an older and widely known motion picture about corrosion, which features Francis LaQue, a renowned authority on marine corrosion who died in 1988,” said Daniel J. Dunmire, Director of the DoD Corrosion Policy and Oversight Office. “We are dedicating the LeVar Burton video to LaQue and four other pioneers in corrosion from the latter half of the 20th century, all of whom were close colleagues. Besides LaQue, these esteemed scholars include Mars Fontana, Herbert Uhlig, Ulick Evans, and Marcel Pourbaix.”
The DoD Corrosion Office also has partnered with the Defense Acquisition University (DAU) to use the pod cast as a training tool for military personnel charged with acquiring new weapon systems, vehicles, and aircraft. The Office also plans to distribute the video to secondary schools throughout the country. “Eventually, anyone will be able to download this important video from the CorrDefense Web site,” Dunmire said.
About the Producers
Dunmire and Lorri Berglund of Bruno White Entertainment worked together as executive producers on Corrosion Comprehension: Combating the Pervasive Menace. The two partnered with Bruno White’s Shane Lord, the project director, and producer Stacey L. Cook. Noted technical experts assisted with the script, including William Abbott of Battelle Memorial Institute; Jerry Frankel, a professor in the fields of corrosion and electrochemistry at The Ohio State University; Rich Hays, manager of Corrosion Research and Engineering at the Naval Service Warfare Center’s Carderock Division; John Scully, a professor of electrochemical science at The University of Virginia; and George Keller and Dick Kinzie, analysts with the DoD Corrosion Office.
For two years, the DoD Corrosion Office has partnered with Bruno White Entertainment to create and produce a series of DVDs and pod casts for training purposes. Bruno White is a full-service provider of content specializing in shooting on-location. The company relies on an in-house staff of producers, writers, editors, graphic artists, camera operators, audio technicians, and production managers.
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