Grassman Honored with Lifetime Achievement Award for Legacy of Structural Innovation

Grassman Honored with Lifetime Achievement Award for Legacy of Structural Innovation

By Alisha Tyer, NSWC Carderock Division Public Affairs

BETHESDA, Md. - For nearly four decades, Jon "Matt" Grassman has contributed to the Navy's structural engineering advancements efforts, supporting ship design, testing, and lifecycle analysis. In recognition of his technical leadership and lasting contributions to the field of naval architecture, Grassman will be honored with the Dr. Murray Strasberg Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Grassman began his Carderock career in 1987 at Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Division, then known as the David Taylor Naval Ship Research and Development Center. Now serving as the Ship Structures Technology Coordinator for the Structures and Composites Division, Grassman continues to support programs that advance ship modeling and simulation, structural health monitoring, and digital twin integration for the fleet.

"When I started, we didn't have the internet," Grassman said. "We shared phones and fought over a hardline to the mainframe. Now, we have near-unlimited computational power compared to the early days and that has changed everything."

Grassman has spent his entire career in Carderock's structures group, where he contributed to the advancement of finite element analysis and supported major research and development efforts that shifted design approaches from test-based to simulation-first. Over the years, he has supported nearly every type of structural project handled within the division.

One of Grassman's early milestones came during live-fire testing in Puerto Rico, where he supported the Navy's effort to validate its ultimate strength code, a tool that predicts the point at which a ship's hull might fail. The test results aligned with the code's projections, providing confidence in the model and setting the stage for future analysis tools.

That effort was followed by a joint demonstration program with the United Kingdom focused on RV Triton, the largest trimaran built at the time. Grassman supported structural analysis, instrumentation planning, and response testing. The data collected from that platform continues to inform research and model development.

"We have more structural data from RV Triton than any other ship I'm aware of," he said. "We're still using it to support AI and machine learning models that help us understand how ships respond in real-world conditions."

According to Grassman, that work played a role in enabling the development of the Navy's LCS-2 trimaran variant. He later served as the structures - and at times, program lead - for the platform, helping inform decisions related to shock trials and material behavior.

Grassman also supported the US-German DYSMAS program to validate modeling techniques for weapons effects, his work led to a finite element modeling guide that has since been integrated into Navy design tools. His international collaboration experience includes programs with Germany, Finland, and the U.K. focused on understanding aluminum ship responses and which supported shock trial readiness for the LCS 6.

"These collaborations taught me that we in the US don't have all the answers," Grassman said. "Learning how other nations approach problems improved my own engineering perspective and added value to the work."

More recently, Grassman has focused on structural health monitoring and life cycle modeling. He is leading the development of a land-based test facility for structural health monitoring that simulates ship conditions and supports the Navy's push toward predictive maintenance and digital twin technology.

"We're working toward full lifecycle awareness of the structure from the time a ship is delivered to the time it's retired," he said. "That includes every repair, every failure, and every operating environment."

Throughout his career, Grassman has made mentorship a priority. He has guided junior engineers through complex projects, encouraging interdisciplinary collaboration and hands-on problem solving.

He encourages his teams to challenge norms, take reasonable risks, and to think innovatively. "We learn the most when we break something," he said. "That's when we find out what works, what doesn't, and how to improve the design."

He encourages young engineers to engage beyond their immediate teams, noting that some of the most productive ideas have come from informal technical discussions with collaborators. In his view, some of the best solutions come not from assigned tasks, but from cross-disciplinary conversations.

"I've had interns go from data entry to data innovation just by overhearing a hallway conversation," he said.

Grassman's approach emphasizes understanding the "why" behind engineering decisions, a focus he says is increasingly important as tools become more automated.

"There's a risk that as tools become more powerful, we stop asking what problem we're actually trying to solve," he said. "My focus toward the end of my career has been getting engineers to think critically - what's the question, and why does it matter?"

Now planning to retire in June 2026, Grassman says he feels fortunate to have had the career he did.

"If I went back and told my younger self what I'd get to work on, I wouldn't have believed it," he said. "I've had the chance to do meaningful work, support the fleet, and learn from incredible people without ever leaving Carderock."

As he looks ahead, Grassman says his focus remains on ensuring continuity and knowledge transfer during his final year.

"I just hope I've helped spark that same fire in others," he said. "That's the legacy that matters most."