Modern Times: Drones Take Out a Undersea Threat

The Republic of Singapore Navy kills a threat:

On 29 Jan 2021, a small underwater explosion occurred in the waters off our Southern Islands. It was barely noticeable, but it was a remarkable event.

The underwater explosion signified a successful neutralisation of an underwater threat by an unmanned surface vessel (USV) - a first in the world.

"It was exciting and satisfying to execute the deployment of a K-STER expendable mine disposal system (EMDS) against an underwater threat. After more than three years of development, and numerous rounds of planning and checks, we finally managed to achieve the successful launch and firing of an EMDS from an USV – a breakthrough in the deployment of USVs!" MAJ Lim Yoong Seet, Head of Readiness and Resource Section, 6 Flotilla shared.

Much more at Naval News here.

Also highlighted is the Singapore Armed Forces intent to upgrade its fleet to include a "Multi-Role Combat Vessel" described here as

Multi-Role Combat Vessel

The replacement of the RSN's Victory-class Missile Corvettes with the Multi-Role Combat Vessels (MRCVs) is proceeding as planned, with six MRCVs expected to be delivered by 2030. The MRCV employs key technologies such as configurable modular payloads and unmanned systems, allowing the vessel to function as a "mothership" for unmanned drones and vessels to conduct a range of missions from peace to war.

Picture from Singapore MINDEF.

ASW Via Drone Boats

Via the Early Bird Brief and C4ISRNet, comes this report of a product test, Elbit demonstrates anti-submarine drone:

Remotely guided by human operators through satellite communications, the Seagull sailed in the Haifa Bay, Israel, to perform the anti-submarine mission using control consoles 2,200 miles away.

“Operating its dipping sonar and Elbit Systems‘ proprietary software, Seagull performed real-time detections and classification of objects, demonstrating capability to deter and dissuade hostile subsurface activity,” according to a Elbit announcement. “The Seagull team included two operators, a USV operator and sonar operator.”

More from the Elbit corporate website:

The Seagull Unmanned Surface Vessel (USV) systems have superior mine counter measures (MCM) capability. This USV facilitates end-to-end mine hunting operations, including detection, classification, location, identification and neutralization of bottom, moored and drifting sea mines while taking the sailor out of the mine field.

The Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) capability provides the navy with a significant tactical advantage by effectively deterring and threatening enemy submarines using an available asset with significantly lower risk.

Featuring switchable, modular mission payload suites, Seagull can perform ASW and

MCM, electronic warfare (EW), maritime security (MS), hydrography and other missions using the same vessels, mission control system and data links.

And more here:

Seagull is a 12-meter long USV that can be operated from a mother-ship or from shore stations. It provides multi-mission capabilities including ASW, Mine Hunting & Mine Sweeping (MCM), Electronic Warfare (EW), maritime security and underwater commercial missions, leveraging modular mission system installation and offering a high level of autonomy.

It features inherent C4I capabilities for enhanced situation awareness and mission endurance of more than four days.

I can see a use for these things. Lots of uses, in fact.


All photos from ELbit Systems.

From the U.S. Navy Office of Naval Research: Updating Flashing Light Transmission to "Text Conversion"

Faster tansmission of needed information during periods of electronic emission control using the old Navy signal lamps - but with a modern twist as described in this ONR press release:

The signal lamp aboard the guided-missile destroyer USS Stout flashed fast light bursts to the USS Monterey, located pierside 250 feet away. Aboard the Monterey, a guided-missile cruiser, its own signal lamp used a mounted GoPro camera to receive the incoming Morse code—which then was converted into text appearing on an accompanying handheld device.

Peering at the device connected to the Monterey’s signal lamp, Scott Lowery chuckled as one word popped up on the screen: “random.”

“I asked them to text me something random, so they signaled the word ‘random,’ ” said Lowery, an engineer at Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Panama City, Florida. “Simple, but it shows the system is working.”

Lowery recently was at Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia, conducting a demonstration of the Flashing Light to Text Converter (FLTC)—a ship-to-ship communication system that he’s helped develop to enable U.S. Navy vessels to use their signal lamps to text message each other.

Sponsored by the Office of Naval Research’s (ONR) TechSolutions program, FLTC features (1) a camera that can be mounted atop a signal lamp and hone in on Morse code bursts from another lamp within view, and (2) a hand-held device or laptop computer connected to this camera to display text messages sent and received.

Linking the commercially available camera and device is a proprietary converter that uses specialized software algorithms to process incoming light flashes into high-frequency signals—and then convert those into text messages. To reply to a text, a Sailor can use the device to type a response that is sent back as a Morse code message via specially powered LED lights that flash automatically.

Since World War II, the process for sending messages using signal lamps has barely changed. It requires someone trained in Morse code to operate the lamp’s shutter by hand, and involves a lot of time receiving, decoding, and replying to messages. Using FLTC, Sailors can quickly and easily type and send messages—with fewer mistakes—even if they don’t know Morse code.

“The best part of this flashing light converter is how easy it is for Sailors to use,” said Lowery. “It’s very intuitive because it mirrors the messaging systems used on iPhones. You just type your message and send it with the push of a button.”

FLTC also would be useful in certain “communications-denied” scenarios at sea where satellite communications is risky or unavailable, said ONR Command Master Chief Matt Matteson.

“FLTC could be extremely valuable if a ship’s main communications go down or if it needs to maintain a low electronic signature to avoid detection by an adversary,” he said.

Video:

Cool DARPA Stuff: The Big "T.U.N.A." Keeping Tactical Data Networks Open

TUNA (Tactical Undersea Network Architecture):

TUNA seeks to develop and demonstrate novel, optical-fiber-based technology options and designs to temporarily restore radio frequency (RF) tactical data networks in a contested environment via an undersea optical fiber backbone. The concept involves deploying RF network node buoys—dropped from aircraft or ships, for example—that would be connected via thin underwater fiber-optic cables. The very-small-diameter fiber-optic cables being developed are designed to last 30 days in the rough ocean environment—long enough to provide essential connectivity until primary methods of communications are restored.

Anti-Submarine Warfare in the 21st Century, Sea "Gliders" Division

Or, as the Sam LaGrone USNI News piece is titled, Navy Deploying Unmanned Gilders from Destroyers to Help ASW Mission, and, no, these are not sail plane air craft, but rather mini ships:

The Navy is set to deploy unmanned buoyancy gliders from its guided missile destroyers in an effort to expand its anti-submarine warfare edge.

The service has used the gliders – that use wave action to travel under the water to record information like water temperature and pressure – to build complex models of the ocean depths the service uses as part of its ASW and mine warfare efforts.

Read the USNI News article for more on this promising use of unmanned tech to help expand the Navy's awareness sphere.

Fast, Heavily Armed Littoral Combat Ships

Sometimes you kill a platform too soon. Sometimes you don't.

Take the patrol hydrofoil ships that the Navy once had, for example. Fast, well-armed anti-surface ship hydrofoils meant to play in the littorals. Pretty reliable, too, and minimally crewed. Four officers, 17 enlisted. Eight Harpoon missiles, small gun (76mm) up front, 48 kts (55 mph). See here.

The downside? Well, according to this Popular Mechanics piece, When the U.S. Navy Had Tiny Hot Rods That Flew Over the Sea:The Pegasus class hydrofoils were a ship in search of a mission.

The six ships of the Pegasus class—Pegasus, Hercules, Taurus, Aquilla, Aries, and Gemini—could certainly sink big ships. But the Navy soon realized that was pretty much all they could do. They couldn't operate with the rest of the fleet, hunt submarines, shoot down enemy aircraft, or do all the other things corvettes, frigates, and destroyers could. Pegasus was a one-trick pony, and her trick could be done by other platforms, including missile-carrying aircraft that the U.S. Navy already had in the hundreds.

Hmmm.

Couldn't do ASW? Couldn't do AAW? Perhaps not in the days the PHMs were designed, but they weren't designed for those mission. Nothing in the rule book says that you couldn't lay patterns of sonobuoys from a PHM and receive signals from them in an "ASW-configured" PHM with some torpedo tubes. Nothing said you couldn't provide anti-air missiles on "AAW-configured" PHMs. You could probably even have other platforms that could operate helicopters or unmanned aircraft from their decks. And perhaps have PHM tender lurking about to do the work that tenders used to do in the absence of shore bases.

A counter-argument to the PM piece from the Christian Science Monitor in 1983 The US Navy's daring new ship: Will six be enough?:

''They [the PHM vessels] can be a better use of resources,'' enthuses retired Capt. Gil Slonim, now president of the Oceanic Education Foundation in Falls Church, Va. ''Should the Navy assign a 3,000- to 10,000-ton ship costing $500 million plus to carry out a task which could be accomplished by a 250-ton ship costing $100 million and with far fewer people? In that context, there is a place for hydrofoils.

''You can't just think single-purpose ships. You have to think mission, the total fleet mission of controlling the seas and projecting power overseas for our island nation,'' Mr. Slonim continues. ''Hydrofoils point the Navy toward 21 st century technology.''

Nothing said you couldn't have squadrons of these things operate together in teams consisting of ASW, ASUW, and AAW units working together depending on the perceived threats in littoral and archipelago areas. Like, say, the Philippines . . . From Navysite:

The PHM project was started in early 1970 by CNO Admiral Elmo Zumwalt in an effort to increase the Navy's number of surface combatants. The project called for a cost-effective hydrofoil boat designed to operate in coastal waters and equipped to fulfill the missions of destroyers and frigates in those areas so that these larger ships could be deployed to areas where they are needed more. These missions included surface surveillance as well as immediate responses (SSM missiles for example) to any hostile actions conducted by enemy navies. (emphasis added)

Lack of imagination, I suppose, coupled with the aviation bias and big gray hull bias of "Big Navy." At any rate, instead of modifying the design to change "one trick" into "several tricks," PHMs died.

Too soon.

So 40 years later we screw around with much bigger, far more costly hulls which still await technology that will allow them to be AAW, ASUW and ASW competent, except for their main weapon system, the attached helicopter/Fire Scout detachment.

Too late.

Nice PHM history article at Hydrofoil World.

Navy Using Technology to Make Landing on a Carrier a Little Less Challenging?

Navy Times reports "New carrier landing software will smooth out the ride":

Landing an aircraft on a carrier now is a delicate dance of shifting left, right, up and down while adjusting the plane's throttle to make up for the tiny losses in speed and altitude for every movement of the nose.

When you do it right, you keep a little ball on the heads-up display just above the flight deck to glide down and catch your tailhook on the wires.

It takes an immense amount of focus and skill, but Naval Air Systems Command's MAGIC CARPET software aims to make it much easier.

"It's this admin task, where they should be focusing on the projection of power that should be our primary mission," Lt. William Dann said at a NAVAIR presentation Friday.

The difference with MAGIC CARPET is that a pilot can change direction without losing speed or altitude. The software simply self-adjusts to maintain a flight path.

Pilots joining the fleet after this system rolls out will probably be grateful, except for having to listen to endless stories about the "old days."

A New Generation of Fighter Aircraft Engines?

Aviation Week reports GE Advances Future Fighter Engine

Development of revolutionary engines at GE Aviation is setting the stage for the next 50 years in military aircraft propulsion, engineers there believe.
***
The engine can adapt in flight to give maximum thrust or long-range cruise, while a third stream of air will cool both the engine and the aircraft’s systems, explains Jean Lydon-Rodgers, vice president and general manager of GE Aviation’s military systems.
***
“The sixth-generation fighter engine is a big piece of the future of the business. That’s why we’re investing heavily in it,” says Lydon-Rodgers.

That investment also involves materials including ceramic matrix composites and titanium aluminides, and techniques such as additive manufacturing, to make the engines lighter and more robust while running hotter and providing more power. The military engines are benefitting from GE’s huge investment in such materials and manufacturing readiness for its next generation of commercial engines, which helps keep the costs down for the warfighter, she says.

Innovation! More range for fighters? Will this allow aircraft carriers greater stand-off range and improve our maritime security? Sure sounds like it.

Let me recommend again Vaclav Smil's Prime Movers of Globalization: The History and Impact of Diesel Engines and Gas Turbines, now available for Kindle:

What makes it possible for us to move billions of tons of raw materials and manufactured goods from continent to continent? Why are we able to fly almost anywhere on the planet within twenty-four hours? In Prime Movers of Globalization, Vaclav Smil offers a history of two key technical developments that have driven globalization: the high-compression non-sparking internal combustion engines invented by Rudolf Diesel in the 1890s and the gas turbines designed by Frank Whittle and Hans-Joachim Pabst von Ohain in the 1930s. The massive diesel engines that power cargo ships and the gas turbines that propel jet engines, Smil argues, are more important to the global economy than any corporate structure or international trade agreement.

Well, it is the 21st Century: "Third-Gen Electric Laser Weapon Now Ready"

Not a prototype

Aviation Week report by Graham Warwick, General Atomics: Third-Gen Electric Laser Weapon Now Ready

The company has responded to an Office of Naval Research (ONR) solicitation for a 150-kw laser weapon suitable for installation on DDG-51-class destroyers to counter unmanned aircraft and small boats using only ship power and cooling.

Under ONR’s Solid-State Laser Technology Maturation program, the weapon is to be demonstrated in 2018 on the USS Paul Foster, a decommissioned Spruance-class destroyer that now serves as the U.S. Navy’s ship-defense test vessel at Port Hueneme in California.

GA-ASI has proposed its Gen 3 High-Energy Laser (HEL) system, which recently completed independent beam-quality and power testing for the U.S. government. The Gen 3 system is the third generation of electrically pumped laser using the architecture developed for Darpa’s Hellads program.

Some info from General Atomics:

DDG 51 with frickin' lasers

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA ASI), a leading manufacturer of Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) systems, radars, and electro-optic and related mission systems solutions, today announced that an independent measurement team contracted by the U.S. Government has completed beam quality and power measurements of GA-ASI’s Gen 3 High Energy Laser System (HEL) using the Joint Technology Office (JTO) Government Diagnostic System (GDS).

“These measurements confirm the exceptional beam quality of the Gen 3 HEL, the next-generation leader in electrically-pumped lasers,” said Claudio Pereida, executive vice president, Mission Systems, GA-ASI.

The new laser represents the third generation of technology originally developed under the High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System (HELLADS, Gen 1) program. The Gen 3 Laser employs a number of upgrades resulting in improved beam quality, increased electrical to optical efficiency, and reduced size and weight. The recently certified Gen 3 laser assembly is very compact at only 1.3 x 0.4 x 0.5 meters. The system is powered by a compact Lithium-ion battery supply designed to demonstrate a deployable architecture for tactical platforms.

The Gen 3 HEL tested is a unit cell for the Tactical Laser Weapon Module (TLWM) currently under development. Featuring a flexible, deployable architecture, the TLWM is designed for use on land, sea, and airborne platforms and will be available in four versions at the 50, 75, 150, and 300 kilowatt laser output levels.

The GDS was employed by an independent measurement team to evaluate the beam quality of the Gen 3 system over a range of operating power and run time. According to JTO’s Jack Slater, “The system produced the best beam quality from a high energy laser that we have yet measured with the GDS. We were impressed to see that the beam quality remained constant with increasing output power and run-time.”

With run time limited only by the magazine depth of the battery system, beam quality was constant throughout the entire run at greater than 30 seconds. These measurements confirm that the exceptional beam quality of this new generation of electrically-pumped lasers is maintained above the 50 kilowatt level.

What's it mean? Try this "Tactical Laser Weapon Module Can Laserify Almost Anything" the title of an Evan Ackerman post at the IEEE Spectrum:

The thing in this picture (you have to follow the above link to see it) isn’t a photon torpedo. But, it’s close. It’s a photon cannon, currently under development by General Atomics. Small, versatile, and completely self-contained, it turns anything onto which you stick it into a powerful laser weapon. And at just two cubic meters in volume, you should have no trouble mounting it on the roof rack of your Volvo.
***
What we were able to find out about this thing is that it’s a laser weapon with output energies (that's output, not total power in the system) ranging from 75 kilowatts all the way up to 300 kilowatts. To put that in perspective, about a year ago we wrote about how Lockheed was using a portable fiber laser to shoot down rockets at a range of 1.5 kilometers using just 10 kilowatts of power. Suffice it to say, 300 kilowatts is rather a lot. The weight of the system is dependent on its output power and the number of shots you want, but General Atomics engineers say that they’ve gotten it down to just 4 kilograms per kilowatt.

Fire Scout? We don't need no stinkin' Fire Scout . . .

Every now and then CDR Salamander has been known to refer to some of my posts. Turnabout being fair play, let's look at his recent post on the proposed cancellation of the rotary winged MQ-8 Fire Scout drone "wonder copter" as set out in "Because after awhile, people tire of being made the fool"

The whole helo-drone program was a good experiment, but as with many experiments as of late - it was . . . oversold . . .

Some of you may recall that prototype of unmanned aerial vehicles, the Drone Anti-Submarine Helicopter (DASH), which has graced these pages before. A program that wandered through the fleet and other places for something like 44 years ending in this final flight (long video - 46 minutes- flying stuff begins about 33:50):



During its day, DASH was used for ASW, gun spotting and as the butt of a zillion sea stories: "It went out and then disappeared over the horizon." In its evolution out of the fleet, some spotted a conspiracy:

The frequently asked question of "Why is it that an aircraft that was so ahead-of-its-time, then in the 1960s, is not used by our Navy/military, today" from our public and military visitors alike needs to be answered and here at the Gyrodyne Helicopter Historical Foundation (GHHF), we felt that the NAVY should answer that question.
Accordingly, here is an internal Navy memo, since declassified, written by Lieutenant Commander Ira B. Anderson USN in 1970 to the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) which offers a glimpse of the internal struggle waged by the Naval Aviators which were frightened at the possibility of being replaced by Drones and the Drone supporters who were convinced that being freed of concern over the loss of human life, true expansion of the military applications of Drones/UAVs could be attained furthering our nations offensive and defensive capabilities.
In that struggle for control, the Navy failed to support its' state-of-the-art UAV program (the first of its kind in the world) and therefore failed DASH.

On the other hand, one of the highlights of the Navy League's Sea, Air and Space Exposition was a report on a software and hardware package that would allow any helicopter to be converted to an unmanned aircraft, as set out here:

A package of sensors and software that is claimed to be able to turn any helicopter into an unmanned craft has passed two demonstration flights.

"In the demonstration tests at Quantico, a Marine with no prior experience with the technology was given a handheld device and 15 minutes of training," said a press release from the Office of Naval Research. "The Marine was able to quickly and easily program in the supplies needed and the destination, and the helicopters arrived quickly-even autonomously selecting an alternative landing site based on last-second no-fly-zone information added in from the Marine.

The Autonomous Aerial Cargo/Utility System AACUS consists of a sensor and software package that can be fitted to manned helicopters to avoid obstacles in low visibility conditions. The same package also enables a helicopter to become an unmanned aircraft.

"A self-flying robot with laser beams. It doesn't get much cooler than that."

Okay. It's being used for cargo helicopters. How about if you put one of those packages on - say- a Super Cobra? A relatively low-cost anti-surface weapon system launched from an LCS? Or any ship with a flight deck?

We already own the aircraft - and they don't need to be state of the art to do that sort of mission. Just saying . . .

Office of Naval Research AACUS info here.

So, the basic question is whether the expense of Fire Scout can be re-directed to making AACUS available for non-cargo use? If so, why pay to develop Fire Scout?

Frickin' Navy Laser Beams in 2014?

It's a start:







Back in Apri of 2013, there was this: Navy Leaders Announce Plans for Deploying Cost-Saving Laser Technology:

Citing a series of technological breakthroughs, Navy leaders announced plans Apr. 8 at the Sea-Air-Space exposition to deploy for the first time a solid-state laser aboard a ship in fiscal year 2014.

"Our directed energy initiatives, and specifically the solid-state laser, are among our highest priority science and technology programs. The solid-state laser program is central to our commitment to quickly deliver advanced capabilities to forward-deployed forces," Chief of Naval Research Rear Adm. Matthew Klunder said. "This capability provides a tremendously affordable answer to the costly problem of defending against asymmetric threats, and that kind of innovative approach is crucial in a fiscally constrained environment."

The announcement to deploy the laser onboars USS Ponce (AFSB[I] 15) comes as Navy researchers continue to make significant progress on directed energy weapons, allowing the service to deploy a laser weapon on a Navy ship two years ahead of schedule. The at-sea demonstration in FY 14 is part of a wider portfolio of near-term Navy directed energy programs that promise rapid fielding, demonstration and prototyping efforts for shipboard, airborne and ground systems.

"Our conservative data tells us a shot of directed energy costs under $1," Klunder said. "Compare that to the hundreds of thousands of dollars it costs to fire a missile, and you can begin to see the merits of this capability."

Ponce is an interesting choice, n'cest pas?

Of course, we also have that "rail gun" thingie:



Zap!