TOWARDS A UUV LAUNCH AND RECOVERY SYSTEM ON A SLOWLY MOVING SUBMARINE

摘要

Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUVs) will play important roles in future naval operations by mitigating risk during dangerous tasks such as mine hunting and reconnaissance missions. However, a reliable UUV launch and recovery system (LARS) for naval platforms, especially submarines, has yet to be developed. This paper summarizes work on a Defence Research and Development Canada project to develop such a system for submerged slowly moving submarines under waves and adapts the active dock from this work to concepts for a small UUV LARS installed under the deck but outside the pressure hull of a generic 70 m long diesel submarine. The LARS is located in free flooding, plausibly sized cargo space aft of the submarine's sail. The current paper focuses on system design considerations and LARS characteristics particular to UUV deployment from submarines. A range of UUV sizes are considered to highlight various system limitations and advantages, and various charging and data transfer possibilities that can be integrated into the cargo hatch are discussed. The goal is to explore the various technical issues a UUV/submarine LARS system faces to provide guidance for future UUV deployment strategies.