A new crewless minehunter is being tested by the Royal Navy.
According to the Royal Navy here, designed to detect the latest mine threats, the system is the fruit of the joint Anglo-French Maritime Mine Counter Measures programme.
The Royal Navy also say that the aim ultimately is to replace crewed Sandown and Hunt-class ships with autonomous systems, ‘keeping the sailor out of the minefield as much as possible’.
“Demonstrators have been delivered to both the Royal and French Navies, the UK model handed over in Plymouth by Thales UK, OCCAR and Defence Equipment and Support, the MOD’s procurement arm.
The system comprises an uncrewed surface vessel, towed sonar and a portable operation centre, and is now undergoing rigorous capability development trials.”
Commodore Steve Prest, the Royal Navy’s Deputy Director Acquisition, was quoted as saying:
“It is exciting to see the first delivery to the Royal Navy from the Maritime Mine Counter Measures. The future of mine warfare is here: the Royal Navy’s minehunting capability programme is real; it’s happening; it’s delivering. We have a lot to learn about this transformational approach to mine warfare, but there is much, much more to come.”
The Royal Navy already has three autonomous minehunting systems operating out of Faslane under the banner of Project Wilton, Harrier, Hebe and Hazard. You can read more about that here.
I think this will prove to be as significant for the future of the RN as the launch of the first Ironclad HMS Warrior. The end of an era. 30 years from now a ‘warship’ will be as different to what we consider today as the change back then.
Yes, I think you are right. A new era dawns.
Yes, it’s likely warships are going to be the centre of a network of autonomous drones, offensive, defensive and sensors.
You could see that these ships will need to be silent as possible ( hard to locate) , with big mission bays for sub surface, surface drones and decent flight decks for airborne.
I think your spot on. They’ll be drone carriers and operators. That will be there wartime role. Type 26 and 31 should be seen as interim designs. They have the guns and missiles we expect from a warship but with mission bays almost as a secondary capacity. In the future it will be the other way around.
Agreed
the Canadian Glam or Dutch Karel Doorman with a 144 VLS would be perfect for this role in the long term, with the Bays already doing a significant portion of this already the mothership idea is where I believe the UK are heading. You just need to look at Iran to know the value of relatively low cost swarms.
A mothership configured for a range of tasks is almost certainly the future.
Spot on. But the effectiveness of these systems will depend on the number procured and there being adequate mothership provision. Hopeless to rely on the 3 overburdened LSDs……
Yep. They may or may not be as numerous but they’ll be purpose built and they’ll be big.
I know this technology is relatively new, but does anyone know if the navy is looking at offensive drones? I’m sure they are, just haven’t seen anything announced yet.
There was a trial not that long ago where an autonomous boat launched a missile, so I think the answer is absolutely yes. It’s just that drones in a support role are easier to make so naturally they come first
And not too likely to be delayed by ‘killer drone’ protests.
Much better to do 80% of the work in the name of an unambiguously good cause like mine clearance.
Although in IT I’m struggling to believe that these unmanned vehicles will have the versatility, capability and reliability offered by the Hunt’s and Sandown’s. Whilst in the RNR I spent a lot of time on 10 MCM River class minesweepers back in the 1980/90’s, so have some first-hand knowledge of the challenges. I fear that the leap straight from manned to autonomous is a bit too large to do in one big bang. I would be more comfortable if the RN wasn’t putting all its eggs in to one unproven basket, and was also buying a small number of traditional… Read more »
Quite agree , Autonomous too a point , I’ve seen even though rare ,Stray lines wrapped around props boat dead in the water ,divers in
Bubbleheads will be the ones mentioned in the quote
‘keeping the sailor out of the minefield as much as possible’.
CD’s will then like now still have to go in and do examinations of the threats to determine the counter measures to be taken.
My point was that, when the Fanfare for this Autonomous Vehicle is over its still not fully Autonomous if you get my drift
Hi Tommo, If one of these boats were to breakdown – leave it. Get another on out of the hangar finish the job and then recover the broken craft. If the craft is at risk of capture stick a Martlet into it and sink it. The point is these things seem hugely expensive to you and me, but to the MoD each one represents a tiny cost when compared to a replacement Hunt, for example. When the concept is fully developed and production is up an running they will be factory built in significantly higher numbers than a frigate in… Read more »
O well we’ll just have too see what’s left in the treasury purse before any production is set in motion whether its feasible or not Costs versus benefits Gunbuster
Sorry Chariotrider name list slip I do apologise too both you ans Gunbuster
Hi Richard I agree, I also spent a lot of time on HMS Helmsdale in the 80/90s. I still think the classical sweep might still be needed in some regions of the world. Whereas I understand ther concept and it does keep ships and crews out of harms way I wonder if we might be moving a bit to fast in this area. I would like to see a mixed MCM fleet of unmanned and manned. Possibly the new manned ships could be designed to become motherships in the future. It appears to me that all future RN ships will… Read more »
Hi Ron, Richard B The RN have been at this a long time and by all accounts the system outperforms the current ships by multiples (is this spin to reduce – maybe). I suspect there will always be some tasks that will need a human, but actually most of this is sensors and its proven that an AI is better than a human when performing virtually any single activity. so I do think this is probably one of those high risk of injury areas that its worth removing humans from the chain wherever possible. It looks to me that the… Read more »
The RN has progressively reduced the risk to the MCMV and its crew (in particular divers) with the successful introduction of UUV/ROV systems such as Seafox and Remus. Belgium and Holland have recently stuck to this now proven approach by ordering new MCMVs similarly equiped. But the RN is being more ambitious by essentially replacing its MCMVs with smaller unmanned autonomous vessels that are deployed from either a local naval base or a mothership – the later commonly assumed to be a Type 32 frigate, although I’m not sure that’s a great idea. So c.2030, a single T32 with her… Read more »
hi Richard
that is indeed the case and one I believe they had to make given they want carriers and the ongoing strains on both funding and manpower
ultimately the RN has made some tough decisions and in the main got them right. Albeit at the cost of losing quite a bit of knowledge and capability.
if it means more escorts and even one more sub I believe it’s worth it
Quwstions,
what happens when no more mines,
or is one saying their will always be mines in the sea,
can they operate in [example] atlantic,north sea, pacific, or rough seas,
and can they be used for other operations and duties like the mannes ships.
just asking chaps,,just asking.
as a follow on, and purely out of interest,
how many other countries are going down this road, or is this just the royal navy,
thanks
I’m sure many are, such as France as indicated in the article. I also suspect the speed the RN is path is mainly due to cost cutting / man power issues, the faster they can remove ships that require man power the better, as the MOD know that further cuts will no doubt come next defence review or sooner.
They have to fully crew the existing fleet as well as T31/26 abs two big carriers.
Then there is the option of Albion #2 out of mothballs – that would be a big mother ship for drones: no question…
I can’t see how it will be possible to fully crew the t31/36/32. They have less crewing needs then their replacements, but we can’t fully crew what we have now. My guess is we will see a lot more use of crew rotation between ships, as they are experimenting with the mine hunters. That way they can extend the maintanance windows for ships and make it looking like nothing is being mothballed.
Couple of general answers to posts below. Lots of countries are going down this route. UK, US, France, Belgium, Holland amongst others. With the export of other former RN ships and systems to other nations expect those countries to also adopt these systems. Almost everyday I see various ASuV craft from Task Group 59 out and about being trialed and tested. MCM boats, Armed RIBs, Small Cat surface surveillance craft (mini 2m Cats) In a first, NAVCENT integrated unmanned surface vessels with manned assets (defensenews.com), solar/wind sail craft, Very large Cats(8M +). The investment and time being spent on these… Read more »
I can see Autonomous / Unmanned is the way things are head, my biggest concern is that we will build motherships even to LHD size that can deploy surface /subsurface from a well deck and UAV/UCAV from flight deck but they won’t arm it sufficiently / provide strong enough escot, so if it does get found and ‘taken out’ we lose a disproportionate capability.
Wouldn’t that only be of use in shallow/littoral waters or could they be used in open water, mid Atlantic for example?
Great the RN taking the lead but we really do need some vessels to ensure we can get the kit to the right area and mother ships should be in grey doing the bizz, not all places will have easy access and of course setting a T31/32 to do it is really an over kill when they should be doing what they need to do and most likely will not be free to do so either. Simple vessels on the lines of what the Dutch are doing would be spot on as eyes in also having eyes in the sky… Read more »
Hi Angus,
I believe the mothership concept is on the way. Also reported on here this week is a tender for a trials vessel to explore operations with autonomous boats and submersibles. The tender is written in a very speicifc way – the MoD knows which craft is wants and the time scales strongly suggest the vessel is already building or built.
So expect to see some mothership autonomous vehicle trials possible later next year but definately in 2023.
Cheers CR
Hi CR, yes it was mentioned more about taking up from trade not actually available in the Fleet. The trials vessel is just that a trails vessel not an actual combat one as it is too small and its duration and capacity would be insufficient to deal with long term deployment with some self defence capability (even a lean manned vessels needs to take care of itself). We had a vessel (old River MCMs, based on North Sea Oil support vessel) that could do it but we sold them all off now we will need to go shopping again. Lets… Read more »