Posted on 06/29/2020 2:00:52 PM PDT by DUMBGRUNT
...a curious vehicle spotted off Florida’s Key West last week. Virtually the only part of it above water is a mast supporting an array of antennae. The vehicle is almost certainly a Wave Glider made by U.S. company Liquid Robotics (now owned by Boeing
On the surface is a ‘float’ like a 10-foot-long surfboard covered in solar cells driving its electronics. This is connected via a tether to an underwater ‘sub’ unit 30 feet below. As waves move the surfboard up and down, the articulated sub converts up-and-down into forward motion typical speed is just 1.3 knots, but the Wave Glider can keep going indefinitely; in 2013, one made an epic 8,000-mile, year-long journey across the Pacific.
A Wave Glider can loiter for extended periods, towing an underwater sonar array and communicating and contacts to direct aircraft or ships on to a target. A fleet of low-cost Wave Gliders could sweep slowly across an area of interest, covering a much wider area than a few expensive manned ships.
Wave Gliders, being acoustically silent and with a low visual and radar signature are stealthy compared to surface vessels. Unlike submarines they continuously feed data back to remote operators.
Back in 2016 I noted a near-identical copy of the Wave Glider called Fugu being tested by the Russian Navy. So, while it is most likely one of ours, the device seen 15 miles off Key West might just be one of theirs. It would not be the first time unmanned water craft were used for spying.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Hazzard to navigation. I wouldn’t like to hit that after a day of fishing.
Probably drug interdiction...
So... According to the title, this is simply a craft with an all female crew?
The S.H.A.R.C. is the most advanced single-man submersible aircraft in the world. The Joes, always on the forefront of developing technology, have continually upgraded the S.H.A.R.C. with the latest in communications and weaponry.
“his is simply a craft with an all female crew?”
Not being particularly sharp or a word maven, could you please toss me a few easy clues??
Thanks.
Unmanned???
In today’s hypercritical environment, I cannot even begin to think in that manner.
I have heard the internet in the Gulag is very slow.
If you think Gulag internet is slow, just wait until you are my age (86.7) and experience "brain function"...{:-)
“If you think Gulag internet is slow, just wait until you are my age (86.7) and experience “brain function”...{:-)”
Being a young septuagenarian, what little brain function speed I had probably slowed down, but I can’t remember.
So I never worry about it.
“Of all the things I’ve lost, I miss my mind the most.” - Mark Twain.
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