NAVAL DRONES

Part 2: UUVs, Fire Scouts and buoys and why the Navy needs lot’s of them. Guest post  by Jan Musil. Sketch by Jan Musil. Hand drawn on  quarter-inch graph paper. Each  square equals twenty by twenty feet. This article, the second of the series, lays out a suggested doctrine of use for the UUVs and Fire Scouts that have already been developed. It is an incremental strategy, primarily calling for using what the Navy already has in hand, adding use of buoys in quantity combined with appropriate doctrinal changes and vigorously applying the result to the ASW mission. In getting this program underway the U.S. Navy can utilize existing sensors, whether for prosecuting ASW, developing sonar projections of the water below, including occasional deep diving missions and whatever else we find a need for the UUV to do. In practice though, generating useful results is far easier to accomplish if the UUV is routinely, though not exclusively, used with a tether so the data...

Part 1: More Drones Please. Lot’s and Lot’s of Them! Guest Post by Jan Musil Sketch by Jan Musil. Hand drawn on quarter-inch  graph paper. Each square equals twenty by twenty feet. Recent technological developments have provided the U.S. Navy with major breakthroughs in unmanned carrier landings with the X-47B . A public debate has emerged over which types of drones to acquire and how to employ them. This article suggests a solution to the issue of how to best make use of the new capabilities that unmanned aircraft and closely related developments in UUVs bring to the fleet. The suggested solution argues for taking a broader look at what all of the new aerial and underwater unmanned vehicles can contribute, particularly en masse. And how this grouping of new equipment can augment carrier strike groups. In addition, there are significant opportunities to revive ASW hunter killer task forces, expand operational capabilities in the Arctic, supplement our South China Sea an...

by Kenneth A. Stewart, NPS Naval Postgraduate School Research Associate Tad Masek, left,  Research  Associate Professor Douglas Horner, center,  and  Research  Assistant  Professor Noel Du Toit, right,  are pictured  on the frozen surface  of  Pavilion Lake,  British Columbia with two   of the Autonomous Underwater  Vehicles (AUV) that they are using to conduct  experiments on  AUV operation in extreme, under-ice environments.   Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) Research Associate Professor Douglas Horner and Research Assistant Professor Noel Du Toit recently returned from remote Pavilion Lake, British Columbia where they investigated Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) operations in extreme, under-ice environments. “The Navy is very interested in our ability to work under the ice using autonomous vehicles,” said Horner. Pavilion Lake is located some 250...

Checking an aircraft for damage can be arduous and meticulous work,  but last week’s issue of  The Economist   highlights  an experimental commercial approach. In simple terms, the Remote Intelligent Survey Equipment for Radiation ( RISER ) drone is a quadcopter with LIDAR and forms the basis for a system to use lasers to automatically detect damage to airliners. The obvious naval application for inspector drones would be for ground-, carrier, and surface vessel-based fixed-wing and helicopter units, although the configurations for each aircraft type and location might make some more practical than others. For example it probably makes more sense to consolidate expertise in inspector drones at regional maintenance and readiness centers than to try to outfit a unit in the small helicopter hangar of every destroyer. But there’s always something to be said for an operational capability. While  The Economist  notes that the drones ar...

This article was submitted by guest author Michael Glynn for CIMSEC’s Distributed Lethality week.  Reprinted with permission from the Center for International Maritime Security. The Navy’s surface warfare community is committed to remedying its lack of anti-surface warfare (ASuW) punch with Distributed Lethality. “If it floats, it fights,” is the rallying cry.[1] Dispersed forces operating together pose challenges for an adversary, but also create targeting difficulties we must solve. The detection range of shipboard sensors is limited by their height above the waterline and the curvature of the earth. Since it appears doubtful leaders would call on a ship to steam into visual range of adversaries, airborne assets are most likely to provide over the horizon (OTH) targeting. In a January 2015 article in Proceedings, Vice Admiral Rowden, Rear Admiral Gumataotao, and Rear Admiral Fanta reference “persistent organic” air assets as key enablers of Distributed Lethality.[2]...

The following is a submission by guest author Chris O’Connor for CIMSEC’s Distributed Lethality week, reprinted with permission of the Center for International Maritime Security . Distributed lethality is a concept that harkens back to the glory days of the US Navy in the age of sail: small groups of ships with operational autonomy fighting the enemy with their organic firepower and capabilities. Operational autonomy was the default state for ships  until Marconi’s radio set--the lack of instantaneous communication meant that commanders had to make decisions by themselves. Concerning distributed lethality, the lack of communications is imposed upon our ships by enemy communications denial in an A2/AD environment. The parallel does not work in the logistics domain as well- warships then had to fend for themselves logistically, while today, we will have to force a new mode of supply on our ships in order for them to operate independently. There are some lessons we can learn fro...

Intercepting and boarding ships for inspection is one of the most common naval missions. These operations are called VBSS, or Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure in naval parlance, and used to enforce sanctions, disrupt illicit smuggling, and impose blockades in wartime.  In the United States, all of the maritime services - Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard - have some form of VBSS teams. VBSS operations range from routine health and safety inspections to high freeboard opposed boardings, the latter category generally conducted by Naval Special Warfare forces.  In any event, even routine vessel inspections can be dangerous. Robotics technology shows potential to mitigate some of the dangers of VBSS. One of the riskiest aspects of any boarding operation is simply getting onto the ship.  A vessel's freeboard is the distance from the water up to the main deck level, which is where most teams will embark. On some ships or smaller indigenous craft such as dhows, a boarding ...