Mine Countermeasures Clearing the Way
France, the UK and US are all moving to greater employment of unmanned assets for mine countermeasure operations.
In this article Andrew White examines the programmes under way and what capabilities are in the pipeline. " The CONOP additionally calls for the Alcyon to be able to deploy ECA Group's A27-M UUV, wich has been specially designed for MCM operations, sea floor surveying and search and rescue missions. The UUV comes with its own launch and recovery system, capable of performing automatic underwater recovery, as well as Triton Imaging applications, ECA Group mine warfare business manager Dominique Mallet told UV. "
" France is also pursuing its own organic MCM solution beyond the collaborative MMCM effort with the UK. The SLAMF (Système de Lutte Anti-Mines Future) is an evolution of the DGA's 2009 ESPADON (Evaluation incrèmentale de Solutions Potentielles d'Automatisation de Deminage pour les Opérations Navales) project. The programme is being spearheaded by DCNS, Thales and ECA Group and has already completed an evaluation process involving lauch and recovery of the double-hulled 'Sterenn Du'USV. DCNS has designed the USV while ECA is offering variations of tis Alister family of UUVs. "
Published in the magazine www.UVonline.com, Volume 20 Number 6, December 2015/January 2016,
Written by Andrew White
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