Technology company L3Harris has delivered three new autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) for the Royal Navy's Project Wilton to support unmanned mine countermeasures and survey operations.
The AUVs can detect and neutralise underwater mines without putting sailors at risk in addition to being able to operate at depths of 300 metres.
The AUVs, along with hot-swappable aft battery sections, are now with the Royal Navy's Mine Hunting Capability (MHC) program. Following the delivery of the vehicles, the navy team spent the subsequent week trialing them to help sailors familiarise themselves with the additional capabilities being offered.
The AUVs employ a collaborative autonomy architecture and automatic target recognition. The Royal Navy will use these vehicles for unmanned mine countermeasures and various missions such as conducting route survey operations in UK waters and international areas to ensure safe navigation for both commercial and military shipping.
The AUVs each measure only two metres long and have a maximum transit speed of five knots. Sensors include a sidescan sonar and a Doppler velocity log.