Costa Mesa (California): Anduril is putting a new autonomous submarine known as Dive-XL through endurance runs off the coast of California, as it seeks to tap into what company executives say they see as a growing commitment from the Pentagon to use unmanned underwater vehicles.
The first test vehicle — a non-missionized version of the Ghost Shark robotic submarine in development for the Royal Australian Navy — recently wrapped up a voyage where it spent 100 hours underway, a precursor to an upcoming demonstration where the Dive-XL will complete a mission in excess of 1,000 nautical miles while fully submerged.
“That’s in the coming months — weeks, if you will. And that’ll be the longest that we believe anyone’s really done,” Shane Arnott, Anduril’s senior vice president for programs and engineering, said.
So far, the tests around the California coast has allowed Anduril to pick up valuable data that will allow it to optimise Dive XL to operate in diverse undersea environments, where undersea terrain and water salinity could have an impact on performance, Arnott said.
“The coast here is kind of like the Grand Canyon of subsea,” he said. “It is wild off California. Some of the terrain, it’s like Star Wars.”
Dive-XL is conceived as a modular uncrewed undersea vehicle (UUV) that can be purchased by both government and commercial customers and outfitted with payloads to serve various missions, whether that’s inspecting offshore oil rigs for energy companies or helping potential military users hunt down enemy submarines. A few sections of the vehicle are standard no matter the customer, including a nose section packed with avionics and sensing equipment that allows for autonomous movement, a tail containing the drive propulsor and a mast on top with communications gear such as acoustic and radio frequency systems.
The smallest version of the Dive-XL can be housed in a 40 foot shipping container, which allows for it to be transported on roads or via a C-17 cargo plane, Arnott said. From there, it can be made bigger by adding additional payload compartments that stretch the size of the vessel, which Arnott said can be bolted on in a matter of hours.
Anduril self-funded the construction of the first Dive-XL, as well as the ongoing demonstrations, due to growing confidence in a US market for the drone, including with the US Navy as a potential customer, executives said.
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