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The Royal Navy has successfully used its smallest surface combatants as vessels of opportunity for autonomous mine countermeasures (MCM) operations for the first time. Seven P2000 patrol vessels of the Coastal Forces Squadron deployed on NATO’s annual Baltic exercise – known as Baltops 24 – during which 50 ships, dozens of aircraft, and 9,000 personnel from 20 nations operated closely together.
Two ships, HMS Puncher and HMS Pursuer, welcomed aboard experts from Zulu Squadron of the Mine and Threat Exploitation Group and their autonomous craft. Zulu Squadron is usually responsible for keeping the waterways clear and safe on the Clyde in Scotland through which the UK’s Vanguard strategic deterrent submarines operate from their base at Faslane.
The unit deployed a team of five to Baltops as a trial to see if they could send expeditionary MCM kit on overseas operations – with a view to them being able to do this anywhere in the world on demand in the future. The team brought with them an autonomous vehicle, which operates independently, scanning the seabed with its sonar to identify potential mines, and a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), which sends a live stream back to the operator to safely find potential mines on the seabed.
While operating in the Gulf of Riga, in the approaches to Latvia’s capital, Zulu Squadron surveyed 620,000 square metres of an historic minefield in just two days. Many of the Baltic’s waterways were mined heavily in both World Wars, while ammunition and ordnance was also disposed of after the conflicts had ended. Only last year it was reported that 80,000 mines and other unexploded remnants are on the seabed.
