Defence technology specialist Thales will deliver new end-to-end autonomous maritime mine hunting systems to the Royal Navy.
The Royal Navy will receive its first four systems over the course of this year. Each system will include several integrated pieces of equipment and subsystems, enabling the accomplishment of highly complex missions: an unmanned surface vehicle (USV), an advanced towed sonar with a multivision sonar; a remotely operated vehicle (ROV); and a lightweight operations centre.
All equipment and subsystems will be supported by a secure command and control system.
Thales has also developed a sonar analysis application that processes sonar data up to four times faster, allowing even more precise detection and classification of sea floor mines.
Deployed and operated from a mother ship and coastal bases, the platforms can handle vast volumes of data, enabling operators to expedite the process of identifying and neutralising mines.
Thales, in cooperation with L3Harris Technologies, had earlier supplied a similar autonomous minehunting system to the French Navy.