USS Vermont (SSN-792) transits the Thames River while conducting routine operations on Oct. 15, 2020. US Navy Photo
ARLINGTON, Va. – In the near future, the U.S. nuclear attack submarine fleet will be able to launch and recover an underwater robot from a torpedo tube, Navy officials said this week. Read More
Operations Specialist First Class Sean McNamara launches the Mk 18 Mod 2 Kingfish for an initial underwater survey of Sweeper Cove on Adak Island in the Alaska’s Aleutian chain. EODMU 1 is providing expeditionary mine countermeasures support in support of Arctic Expeditionary Capabilities Exercise 2019. EODMU 1 provides operational EOD capabilities to include locating, identifying, rendering safe, exploiting, recovering, and disposing of all explosive ordnance. US Navy photo
The Navy plans to deploy the early models of its Razorback medium-sized unmanned underwater “as soon as we can” even as the service is in the midst of procuring an upgraded model. Read More
Sailors assigned to Unmanned Undersea Vehicle Squadron 1 (UUVRON 1), mobilized with Undersea Rescue Command (URC), perform maintenance on a Bluefin-12D, an unmanned underwater vehicle, on board the Norwegian construction support vessel Skandi Patagonia on Nov. 25, 2017. URC is mobilized to support the Argentine government’s search and rescue efforts for the Argentine Navy diesel-electric submarine A.R.A San Juan (S 42). US Navy photo.
Development squadrons working with unmanned underwater and surface vehicles are moving out quickly to develop concepts of operations and human-machine interfaces, even as they’re still using prototypes ahead of the delivery of fleet USVs and UUVs, officials said this week. Read More
A Ghost Fleet Overlord test vessel takes part in a capstone demonstration during the conclusion of Phase I of the program in September. Two existing commercial fast supply vessels were converted into unmanned surface vessels (USVs) for Overlord testing, which will play a vital role in informing the Navy’s new classes of USVs. US Navy photo.
Several Navy program officials and resource sponsors today outlined how they’ll spend the next couple years giving Congress enough confidence in unmanned surface and underwater vehicles to allow the service to move from prototyping into programs of record. Read More
A Knifefish unmanned undersea vehicle (UUV) training model undergoes crane operations aboard the Military Sealift Command expeditionary fast transport vessel USNS Spearhead (T-EPF 1) as part of a training exercise enabling mine countermeasure missions (MCM) from an EPF as a Vessel of Opportunity (VOO). Knifefish is a medium-class mine countermeasure UUV designed for deployment off the littoral combat ship in 2019. US Navy Photo
The Navy is kicking off a pilot program for an autonomy lab that would eventually help test and integrate new advances in autonomy software with existing unmanned vessels, keeping the unmanned fleet outfitted with the newest capabilities for the lowest development cost. Read More
A Mk 18 Mod 2 Kingfish sits on a rigid-hull inflatable boat operated by an unmanned systems platoon under EOD Mobile Unit 1 out of Naval Station Point Loma, Calif., on Feb. 11, 2019. USNI News photo.
The Navy this week released a request for proposals for a Medium Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (MUUV) that is meant to streamline two existing unmanned systems into a single open architecture UUV. Read More
Operations Specialist First Class Sean McNamara launches the Mk 18 Mod 2 Kingfish for an initial underwater survey of Sweeper Cove on Adak Island in the Alaska’s Aleutian chain. EODMU 1 is providing expeditionary mine countermeasures support in support of Arctic Expeditionary Capabilities Exercise 2019. EODMU 1 provides operational EOD capabilities to include locating, identifying, rendering safe, exploiting, recovering, and disposing of all explosive ordnance. US Navy photo.
This post has been updated to correct that the Razorback UUV is meant to be operated from a submarine. It was developed under the formerly named Program Executive Office for Littoral Combat Ships but was never part of the LCS mission package.
SAN DIEGO, Calif. – As the Navy explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) community’s capability grows in both sophistication and in quantity, a community leader says they’re being served well by their creed to remain hardware-agnostic. Read More
A Naval Sea Systems Command-developed Iraqi 60-meter Offshore Support Vessel. US Navy briefing material indicate that early versions of the service’s large unmanned surface vessels could be based on OSV designs. US Navy Photo
The Navy has put a call out to industry to send in ideas for its planned fleet of corvette-sized unmanned surface vehicles, according to a draft request for proposal announced on Wednesday. Read More
Medium Displacement Unmanned Surface Vehicle (MDUSV) prototype Sea Hunter pulls into Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii on Oct. 31, 2018. US Navy Photo
NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – The Navy has tightly coupled early prototyping efforts and future acquisition efforts for medium and large unmanned surface vehicles, to speed up the time it will take to experiment with the vessels and get them fielded to fleet commanders, the program manager said last week. Read More
