Norway’s Kongsberg Maritime announced on 4 February that it is expanding its HUGIN family of modular autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) with the HUGIN Endurance: a new variant that has been specifically designed for extended operations in deep sea environments.
The company claims HUGIN Endurance will offer up to 15 days of mission runtime and travel distances of up to 2,200 km – which it notes is the equivalent of sailing from New York City to Cuba – enabling shore-to-shore commercial and military inspection and survey operations without the need for an attendant mothership. However, it can still be launched and recovered on a vessel of opportunity (VOO) if desired.
Concept art of the new long-range HUGIN Endurance AUV. (Kongsberg Maritime)
The AUV can also be configured with a range of sensors focused on mission capabilities and situational awareness, such as the HISAS 1032 dual-receiver synthetic aperture sonar (SAS), which is claimed to be capable of generating a 1,000 m swath at 2.5 kt with a typical resolution of 5×5 cm for SAS imagery. It can also be equipped with the EM series of multibeam echo sounders, with the latest EM 2040 Mk II offering a swath coverage sector of up to 170° with a single receiver, as well as refined software processing algorithms for improved data quality.
When combined, these bathymetric sensors can generate imagery of 20 cm resolution across a 750 m wide swath when the AUV is travelling at 3.5 kt and 40 m altitude and potentially map an area of up to 1,100 km2 in size on a single mission.
Other payloads can include conventional sidescan sonars, sub-bottom profilers, scientific multibeam sonars, and a variety of other active and passive sensors to address specific mission requirements.
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