2014: The Year in Naval Drones

By -
It's time for our annual wrap-up of the stories on unmanned naval systems that most resonated on this site, social media feeds, and the public writ large.  Here are the top naval drone stories of the year:

The introduction of UAVs for maritime missions by non-state actors, specifically migrant rescue and anti-piracy, became reality.


The Royal Navy established a UAV Squadron to intitutionalize its ScanEagle operations.


Despite continued operational testing with the X-47B prototype, politics and indecision created further delays with the U.S. Navy's UCLASS RFP (still not released by the way).


Unmanned systems were key in the Malaysian Airlines Flight #370 Search.


The MQ-8C Fire Scout made significant strides towards its first operational deployment.

The U.S. Navy's Swarming USV program, really a plug and play unmanned craft system, garnered significant interest.


Interestingly, the story that seemed to pick up the most momentum in non-military circles was the Navy's Ghostswimmer UUV.  And that's interesting because this system is neither really new, nor particularly likely to ever be employed operationally.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2013 Naval Drones Survey

By -
What are the latest trends in unmanned systems?  What technologies show the most promise to enhance future naval operations?  Readers of this site represent naval and industry professionals, academics, and other interested parties from more than 160 countries. We're offering an anonymous survey to understand this wealth of knowledge contained in our readers' insights and experience.  The results will be discussed in future posts in this space.  Please take a few minutes to respond to the 8 easy questions. Link for mobile sites: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/RT5YKFB *Note - you will not be emailed, phoned, nor otherwise accosted for responding.
Read more...

CHINA SEIZES U.S. NAVY UNDERWATER DRONE

By -
Image
On December 15th 2016, the Chinese Navy seized an American unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) operating in international waters off the Western coast of the Philippines. The  USNS Bowditch ,  an unarmed T-AGS class hydro-graphic survey ship, was being shadowed by a People’s Liberation Army-Navy (PLAN) salvage vessel identified as a Dalang-III class (ASR-510). Graphic by: CIMSEC Member Louis MV The UUV had surfaced as part of a pre-programmed instruction, and sent  a radio signal marking it’s position for pick-up. As the Bowditch was preparing to recover the drone from the water, a small boat crew from the Dalang III raced in and plucked the unmanned vessel. The incident occurred approximately 50 nautical miles northwest of Subic, Luzon. While the exact type of drone is unknown, there have been several instances of U.S. Navy   Slocum Gliders   snagged in local fishermens’ nets or washed ashore on beaches in the Philippines. This type of drone is not weap...
Read more...

CATCH OF THE DAY: REFLECTIONS ON THE CHINESE SEIZURE OF A U.S. OCEAN GLIDER

By -
By Heiko Borchert On 15 December 2016, China seized an  Ocean Glider , an unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV), used by the U.S. Navy to conduct oceanographic tasks in international waters about 50-100 nautical miles  northwest of the Subic Bay port  on the Philippines. Available information suggests that the glider had been deployed from USNS  Bowditch  and was captured by Chinese sailors that came alongside the glider and grabbed it “despite the radioed protest from the  Bowditch  that it was U.S. property in international waters,” as the  Guardian  reported. The U.S. has “ called upon China  to return the UUV immediately.” On 17 December 2016 a  spokesman of the Chinese Defense Ministry  said China would return the UUV to the “United States in an appropriate manner.” Initial legal assessments by U.S. scholars like  James Kraska and Paul Pedrozo  suggest the capture is violating the law of the sea, as the unmanne...
Read more...