Solar and wind-powered surveillance drones have been tested in the Gulf by the Royal Navy.

Sail drones are packed with cutting-edge sensors to monitor activity.

According to this Royal Navy news release:

“The multi-national task force – commanded by the Royal Navy’s Commodore Don Mackinnon – is responsible for the security of merchant shipping passing through some of the region’s narrowest and dangerous waters, such as the Strait of Hormuz, gateway to the Gulf, and the Bab-al-Mandeb at the foot of the Red Sea. The task force uses a combination of small patrol vessels to keep an eye on goings on and larger warships, such as frigate HMS Montrose to provide reassurance and protection to the hundreds of oil and gas tankers, bulk carriers and cargo vessels operating in the region.

Sail drones are already in use with the US Navy, who loaned them to the Bahrain-based task force to test how they might use them on a security patrol, working hand-in-hand with surface ships.

The drones rely on wind and solar polar to patrol continuously in pre-programmed patrol areas. They were able to alert the Sentinel headquarters ashore about an unidentified vessel approaching Bahrain. The staff then alerted a nearby Bahraini patrol vessel, the Al Muharraq, to intercept and investigate while the headquarters continued to observe the entire situation remotely.”

The Royal Navy also say that the trial proved that collectively, the drones and patrol vessel were able to patrol and monitor a far greater area of sea than an individual warship working on its own.

You can read more here.

Tom Dunlop
Tom Dunlop
Tom has spent the last 13 years working in the defence industry, specifically military and commercial shipbuilding. His work has taken him around Europe and the Far East, he is currently based in Scotland.

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72 COMMENTS

  1. I do not know how much this costs but I can think of better things to spend a very limited budget on.

    • Not everything in defence is about high end tanks and warships. This type of operation is the daily grind and bread and butter of global operations. And if these enhance the capability of deployed task groups to cover a much wider area of surveillance than an individual warship can on its own. That it’s worth it.

      • I would tend to agree If we had the “tanks and warships” or any offensive capability at the moment we are spending a lot of a rather meagre budget on “eyes and ears” but we need some teeth as well.

        • The Russians have got lots of teeth, but it’s not doing them a lot of good at the moment. Also, to claim we have no offensive capability is clearly daft. More would obviously be nice, but to claim we have none is deluded.

          • We are not talking of the Russian forces we are talking about the British armed forces we have a RN with a hand full of obsolete SSM with a replacement 10 years away, we have 2 aircraft carriers with no aircraft, we have destroyers designed for but not fitted with ABM that have ongoing issues with breakdowns, we have 6 SSN’s with a 7th on the slips but only have a max of 3 at sea at any one time, we have anti Submarine frigates that can detect a submarine but have no way of engaging it if the weather is bad. We have an RAF reduced from 600 front line fighters to 100 and an army that will struggle to keep 1 division in the feild for any length of time
            I do believe that you are the deluded one!!!

          • Well if putting ships to sea with extremely limited offensive capability and having aircraft carriers with no aircraft being escorted by destroyers that have spent more time along side than at sea due to problems that were pointed out long before they were launched that along side frigates that are taking 10 years to build when most of our competitors are building frigates in less that 5 years, if that is what an education dose for you I for one am happy that I did not go to the same school as you and your kind.

          • Steven,

            What are all the F35 thingies that are floating around for? We deployed 8 last year on the Queen Elizabeth and I’m sure we have had delivery flights of more since then…

            I think we can deploy more aircraft carriers and planes on board than Russia could dream of…

            as for the slow build rate for the type 26’s it could be speeded up fairly quickly, my understanding is the build rate was slowed by the treasury. But bear in mind, we are building two brand new classes of frigates simultaneously and just a small injection of funds could bring the new ships into service much quicker… hopefully with the disorder created by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine we will see the speeding up of things.

          • Hopefully you are right about the speeding up of the build time of the T26’s but to say that we are trying to save money by building slowly is a non starter as the quicker you build the less over heads you have so the cheaper it turns out, plus the more you order the cheaper it will work out as you can mass order all the parts at the same time. So by ordering in dribs and drabs and extending those build over an extended period you are in fact building extra costs into the programme.

            We have 2 carriers at sea at the moment each carrier needs a minimum of 10 to 12 F35’s just to maintain a CAP on a war time footing that is with out the strike capacity which would need the same again, then there is the attrition of brake downs and service availability not to mention the number of pilots available. I believe we have a confirmed order of 48 F35’s with 13 available at the moment the rest being trickle feed to the MoD over the next 4 to 5 years. So the only way we are going to keep our 2 carriers at sea with a reasonable compliment of F35’s is to have the USMC permanently stationed on both carriers much like last years QE deployment to the Far East.

            It’s not what the Russians can dream of it is what our political elite can dream up old boy!!

          • I could debunk every single part of your comments. But it will go over your heard, so I’m not wasting my time.

          • Oh yes Robert, commoners like me are only good for manning these under equipped, underpowered and ill thought-out bit of kit hay what!!

            If I am so low on the intellect scale would it not be better to help a poor sole like me to understand why we are sending ships to sea that continually brake down and why we have aircraft carriers at sea with no aircraft and why we have to wait 10 years to get any anti surface capability put back on board our ships and while you are in a good mood please explain why we have to wait 10 years for a frigate to be built while the rest of the world only have to wait 5 years.

            As I have eluded to on other forums like this it is only the over educated and foriegn agents that seem to think there is nothing wrong with our armed forces.

          • I served in the RN for 14 years. I understand exactly what we can and cannot do. Your remarks are way off pal.

          • Am I Robert, I do not know when you served or in what capacity but you have no idea what is at sea at the moment.

          • Wrong. Why do you think Ford invented the production line? Have you ever seen how many U boats the Germans managed to produce in WW2 despite Allied (mostly RAF bombing).
            We should open up the 2nd stream at Rosyth and get building frigates and arm them fully as well as ordering more F35B’s and the offensive weapons they need.
            We are going to be on our own. USA with a Biden or even Trump will caste us adrift to fend for ourselves. We need to get manufacturing the parts the Australians and Candians need for their Type 26’s.
            For once we need to look ahead ten years and it isn’t pretty.

    • Why put an expensive aircraft, ship or submarine in an area simply to support a sensor package when you can use multiple small drones like this to do the same thing. Drones are the only solution to give us combat mass on a limited budget.

      • As I said above, I agree with you sentiment but we need some offensive capability put back into our forces like aircraft for the aircraft carriers, more submarines, an anti ship missile system, an anti ballistic missile system, I could go on for some time but what I am saying is as well as the soft stuff we need the hard stuff as well.

        • Don’t disagree, we need more teeth but maybe the thinking is, the more monitoring we do the more information we gather and the better informed we can be so can make better decisions on where to put our meagre numbers of combative resources.

          • I agree, the more info on the table the better we are but it has to go forward together with a steady investment in the heavy hitting side as well as the eyes and ears, for the last 20 to 30 years we are all eyes and ears, so is it not time to start putting back into the fleet some heavy hitting power.

  2. Essentially a solar powered intelligence gathering bouy that is not tethered to the sea bed, stick it in one of the most busiest sea lanes in the world. Worth punt? Something like this washed up on the coast of Scotland a couple of years ago, it wasn’t claimed as I understand it. It looked like a surfboard with solar panels stuck on top of it. On a more serious point if it works all well and good if it is woth the cost.

    • Mark Knowing the Navy’s blue sky thinking team ,these assets would be put into shipping lanes as you suggested without Navigation Lights Whoops

  3. What’s to stop the bad guys coming up in a fast boat, lifting it aboard, and recycling it into its component parts

    • The systems sensors would detect it, presumably live stream direct night/day visual evidence of the approaching vessel to nearly assets
      In this example it is providing persistent patrol of Bahrains territorial waters.
      The bad guys would be caught red handed entering a nations waters and tampering with its military infrastructure. Some might say that would deserve the retaliatory response. Hence the cheap sail powered sensor has done the valuable job of a border guard at minimal impact on a militaries manpower

  4. So, the US trialled the sail drones, as part of a task group that happened to be commanded by the UK? Not quite the same thing as the UK trialling them?

    • US gave the drones to Bahrain who trialled them with the British. Bahrain ship RBNS Al Muharraq deployed them and British HQ received and processed the data.
      The Sentinel taskforce is currently under the command of British Commodore Don Mackinnon.

  5. This kind of nonsense trial is used by the RN to delay buying a couple of small rotaries for the OPVs. As long as they are evaluating alternatives, they don’t need to get on with it.

    There’s supposed to be a UCR for something to replace the ScanEagle, but they’ve been vaccilating for a decade. Toss a coin guys! Heads it’s the Schiebel, tails it’s AWHero. (If it comes down on its edge you can buy the Skeldar.)

      • If these have underwater monitoring capabilities, I missed that and it would change my opinion. The article focused on increasing the area of the surface monitorable by a patrol vessel.

  6. It’s important to test new ideas out even if they lead no where. Group think is a disaster for militaries so we must be willing to try new ideas and concepts and keep adapting. Yes we should spend our money wisely but I doubt whether these will break the bank. However, trialing new ideas can lead to game changing technologies. I’m quite interested in maybe getting start-ups involved in defence programmes as left field ideas can often produce something that changes the way we operate, deploy and fight. We can see what a focus on old technologies and old ways of fighting is doing for the Russian military (the Ukrainians are doing a great job of showing the Emperor has no clothes). We should keep our own navy, army and airforce on their toes with new innovations and new ways of thinking – whilst investing in conventional approaches until these are shown to be obsolete. Moreover, I’m wary of civil servants, that can’t adapt or think in new ways. We should shake things up a bit with these kinds of initiatives to see what falls out.

      • A wind-powered drone. I know it’s more of a loitering package of sensors than an offensive weapon, but how could wind power possibly be a practical solution where solar powered electric engines exist?

        • Wind is a marvellous means of powering water craft. Unless you’ve sailed a fair bit it’s difficult to understand how effective wind power is especially on the ocean. The solar electric engine will be a back up for fine manoeuvres. You just cannot generate the same available energy in a battery and electric motor on a small craft as you would get from a sail.

          • Yeh, the sailing speed record is 65knots!

            Plus the Royal Navy’s sailing ships stayed at see for two years at a time when blockading the French fleet – so yeh wind power is a natural for certain tasks especially if backed up by solar power.

            Interesting concept well worth investigating.

            Cheers CR

          • Yes, long loiter time autonomous sea vessels that can sail themselves effectively could be a way forward. The solar, battery motor, will just ensure they don’t suffer some of the hazards of sail power alone, specifically the leeward shore that killed so many sailors. Although modern sailing vessels can sail upto 45 degrees into the wind and still make headway so it’s less of an issue. Although they can still get embayed, especially I would imaging an autonomous vessel ( which one would think would still be a more stupid sailor than an experienced sailor who knows the coast).

            What most people don’t understand is modern sailing vessels can actually sail faster that the windspeed. Love sailing it’s one of my favourite things.

          • I used to sail Challenger Trimarans and I met my wife on the STS Lord Nelson. Shoulders would struggle these days, but happy memories 🙂

            As for sail speeds I would suggest that the 65knot record was set in a wind strength far lower as a 65+ wind speed is going to be create rough seas which is not good for any vessels trying to going fast…

            Cheers CR

          • I’m not sure I would want to go 65knots in a small sailing vessel on any sea state 🤢🤢🤢🤢🤢🤢🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

  8. Our major security threat is now underwater cables and pipelines. We have so much critical under sea infrastructure now that unmanned systems and hundreds of them is the only solution. We have been doing this with fixed systems like SOSUS for decades but these are now vulnerable and ineffective. Moving sensor drones are the best way forward. We have been dropping Sonar Buoys from aircraft for decades this is not much more different. You can have hundreds of such systems right across the Atlantic sharing a data picture with a single Astute, P8 or T26 and you end up with a more effective defensive perimeter than from a dozen or more frigates.

  9. I like the idea, but would it not be more cost effective to employ an Aerostat system to do the same thing? I would think that this particular system would be vulnerable to being hijacked by a small speed boat.

  10. I do wonder what the salvage laws would say about this…..your unman vehicle seemed to be in danger and distress, I rescued it for you…… salvage costs please thankyou….I could see whole future industry of rescuing autonomous sea vehicles in distress.

    • Foreign naval vessels can no longer be salvaged. In the Cold War era they could and the US “salvaged” a Soviet sub, but the law was subsequently changed.

      • Hi Jon, that was for sunken vessels, so all sunk military vessels remain the property of the nation. I’m taking about the saving of a vessel from danger. The owner always stays the owner, but has to provide the salvor with a fee, even if there was no contract ( I have save your £500,000 dollar autonomous vessel from being embayed, time to pay up mate).

        “As it may be assumed that unmanned ships will come into danger, the salvage rules will also continue to be useful” Professor Dr Eric Van Hooydonk (JIML 2014).

  11. the creation of swarms of autonomous sensor vehicles reporting to sensor and processing nodes will be the way forward. Armed forces with theses systems and the ability to combat others sensor swarms will come out ahead. It’s one of those times when what came before becomes redundant and essentially nothing more that a costly target.

    Its why investing in large hulls with plenty of spare space will ensure ships will have currency.

    It is also one of the reasons we may one day see a 2 seater F35….when a swarm is able to tell you everything you need a mind free to be able to concentrate on anything.

    You can see a future when most combat will be won or lost ( even more than now) in the EW and cyber, with swarms being the functional weapon systems of the future.

  13. Re..wind power. I once saw an article that said if HMS Victory had all her sails out and there was a stiff breeze blowing, the sails would generate a thrust equivalent to about 5000 horse power. No idea if it’s true, but it sounds feasible.
    What IS feasible is the notion of sail powered drones. Fibreglass masts and Dacron sails would be invisible to radar almost, at that size. Small solar panel on the deck. persistence personified.
    Not sure about bad weather though?
    AA

    • Possibly why they trialed it in the benign Gulf rather than the N Atlantic mid-winter. Curiously appeals to my model-yacht-pond sailing childhood memories.
      Could be returning more to sail powered merchant ships to reduce greenhouse gas pollution.

    • Or correct usage of the International Navigation system (Rules of the road) Nav lighting ,Ball,Diamond Ball when operating ? Or just wing it and hope it doesn’t get run over

    • Like a long canoe with a sail and extra bit sticking out half way up. It must be a permanent sail as it has a solar panel on it.
      Situational awareness is very important.
      With these, radar and other systems helping to feed into the picture it can only be a good thing.
      As for someone stealing it, there will be some boffins with great ideas of how to stop it. Presumably they are always moving so that should make stealing it a bit harder.
      How about an electric shocker round it. Touch it and zap.
      Stink bomb launcher using the boats sensors to find the target thief.
      One of those noisy things, Like a large personal alarm. Can’t remember what they are called.
      Barbed wire.
      Submarine mode. It opens valves and sinks. When it’s 50feet down it stops. Some hours later it pops back up.
      Water cannon built in.
      The list could go on for ages, the drone only needs to hold off until the manned vessel/aircraft etc can get close

  17. Can’t wait too see these being trialed Sunday afternoon at Canoe Lake Southsea in 5 yrs time when ditched by the Navy Sorry a bit of Sarcasm

      • 👍👍 Frank, I can see the RNLI being called out too look for the missing Boarder , unless it’s Canoe Lake the swans would Attack them

  18. If the trials are successful, will the MoD order a “fleet” direct from the US manufacturers or will they invite tenders from British yacht builders to come up with something better. What do correspondents think?

  19. main issue i forsee with this type of unmanned stuff……when your average fisherman accidentally (or on purpose) catches them and then said “cutting edge” tech mounted on them gets sold to adversaries….

  20. Are there any updates on where the “real ships” are at, T31/T26s, and the remaining Astutes? Any talk from the MOD of bringing the schedules forward or increasing their quantities in light of the current times?

    • Spring statement is on Wednesday. We’ll know after Rishi finishes his speech whether more money will be available, if there isn’t then the answer to your question is “no”. Even if there is I’d say the likelihood of being able to fast track any of that is slim. The T31 and T32 perhaps as that shed has space for 2 to be built at once I believe.

  21. I have seen these things ashore when not in use and in the sea undertaking trials. They are also joined by regular drone boats of at least 5 other types and sizes. The testing of the drones happens daily and its very rare to not see a drone of some type undertaking trials or being put to use.

    By the way the sail drones are pretty big. You don’t get a sense of scale unless you are close to one… I have stood next to one, out of the water and on its trailer and they are impressive bits of kit.

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