In 2012, the Office of Naval Research (ONR) issued a broad agency announcement to develop unmanned surface vehicle (USV) payloads for Single Sortie Detect to Engage (SS-DTE) Mine Countermeasures. The purpose of the program is to develop a modular open systems architecture (MOSA) to destroy or neutralize near-surface floating/drifting and bottom mines.
The program did not specify a particular USV, but envisions a 40-foot USV platform carrying four smaller unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs). Two UUVs would search for floating/volume mines on or near the surface and two would search for bottom mines. The USV would also carry up to 24 expendable neutralizers, plus onboard payload management, communications, and data processing. In March 2013, the Payload management and MOSA tasks of the BAA were canceled.
ONR Awards Contracts to Raytheon and Applied Physical Sciences for Mine Countermeasures
31 May 2013 - The Office of Naval Research (ONR) awarded contracts to Raytheon's Integrated Defense Systems Segment and Applied Physical Sciences worth $1.9 million and $1.4 million, respectfully to develop a single sortie mine countermeasures unmanned surface vessel architecture.