Thales’ Uncrewed Surface Vessel Passes a Significant Milestone in Autonomous Mine Hunting Trials

The program aims to deliver world-leading maritime mine warfare capabilities, keeping the UK and France at the forefront of naval autonomous systems technology. The delivery of uncrewed mine clearance platforms will allow the Royal Navy (RN) to continue its important role of keeping shipping lanes open without putting  sailors or crewed platforms into the threat area.

Fitted with a powerful combination of sensors, including radar, LIDAR (light detection and ranging), and electro-optical and infrared cameras, the vessel’s position was continuously relayed to the command-and-control center over a secure communications network.

This connection enabled the command-and-control software to merge the sensor inputs into a single (Coherent) tactical picture using Thales MCube mission management software. It also allows detecting and tracking other vessels and taking appropriate actions, including remotely controlled avoidance maneuvers.

In service, these vessels will be capable of operating in national waters or being air-transported quickly across the world to hunt for mines in danger zones or secure sea lines of communications while demonstrating high reliability, autonomy, and cybersecurity rates. They can be deployed and operated from ship and shore bases providing configurable and performant capability.

RNMB Apollo is one of the two pre-production Uncrewed Surface Vessels delivered to the Royal Navy and Marine Nationale (French Navy) in December 2021 as part of the joint UK-France Maritime Mine Counter Measures (MMCM) program, which will bring autonomous mine hunting capability to the two respective Fleets.