Boeing Orca Extra-Large Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (XLUUV)

I personally would not want to mark my exact location with a breaching weapon. I’d be more interested in a mk48 with electric propulsion for reduced noise and extended range at slow speed settings.

But I think the future for USN undersea warfare is the SSN more as a remote sensor/effector delivery and management systems (both static bottom/moored and UUVs) with traditional torpedoes becoming more of a secondary weapon for ASW.
 
asVAL said:
Broke: SUBROC.
Woke: swarms of supercavitating torps homing on a contact. Yes, it is a glaring sonar signal, but you cant evade it anyway.
Best: revive Sea Lance with Mk54.
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Dunno about swarms of Shkvals, but yes. A supercavitating torpedo would be wicked.


Josh_TN said:
I personally would not want to mark my exact location with a breaching weapon.
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If you're far enough away that the broaching weapon is your best option for a fast shot, it's tolerable. But you still GTFO as soon as it launches.



Josh_TN said:
I’d be more interested in a mk48 with electric propulsion for reduced noise and extended range at slow speed settings.
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Mk48 already has pretty good range at its low speed setting. It's supposedly got a swim-out mode, too, but I'm not sure how well that works with as tight as they fit in the tube. The Ohio turbine impulse pump was pretty quiet.



Josh_TN said:
But I think the future for USN undersea warfare is the SSN more as a remote sensor/effector delivery and management systems (both static bottom/moored and UUVs) with traditional torpedoes becoming more of a secondary weapon for ASW.
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That still requires stealthy comms underwater, which isn't easy to do.
 
The alternative is noisy coms and just put them everywhere. If it is just a buoy, what can anyone do to destroy it? A torpedo isn’t going to work or be cost effective even if it did. Depth charges?
 
Josh_TN said:
The alternative is noisy coms and just put them everywhere. If it is just a buoy, what can anyone do to destroy it? A torpedo isn’t going to work or be cost effective even if it did. Depth charges?
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Muraena 30mm gun mast on the sub, door gun on helicopters, etc.
 
I suspect any sensors laid by the USN are full submerged. The only thing in the old SeaWeb experiments that was above water were the radio gateway buoys. All of the sensors and acoustic repeaters were moored or on the seabed. Communication is likely handled by UUVs, possibly gliders, offloading data at regular intervals. Or else SSNs directly connected to a node in the network.
 
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Hope they can finally get that system working. It is years behind schedule. I wonder if Ghost Shark beats it to full operational status.
 
Not clear what UUV or ilUAV they could be talking about. IIRC payload is mass limited to 8000 lbs
 

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