Defence Events

Sonardyne demos Sentinel diver and UUV tracking at ANTX

Posted 28 August 2019

Underwater maritime security specialist Sonardyne Inc. will present its advanced unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) tracking results at the Advanced Naval Technology Exercise (ANTX) this week in Newport, Rhode Island.

Courtesy Sonardyne

The event’s attendees will be shown the results of recent trials which tested Sonardyne’s Sentinel Intruder Detection Sonar (IDS) against elite US Navy divers and small UUVs. Specifically, the strength of Sentinel IDS’ combined active and passive intruder detection sonar for ship and harbour security, against even the smallest UUVs, will be demonstrated.

Since its introduction, Sonardyne’s Sentinel has been used in critical national infrastructure (CNI), vessel and VIP protection duties around the world. Sentinel IDS detects, tracks and classifies a wide range of threats including divers, swimmer delivery vehicles (SDVs) and UUVs, when approaching a protected asset from any direction. It then alerts security personnel to the threat.

ANTX has become a key naval technology collaboration, development and demonstration event in the US calendar, bringing together more than 1,000 naval, academic and industry attendees at the US Naval Undersea Warfare Center’s (NUWC) Narragansett Bay Test Facility (NBTF) in Newport. The NBTF is a test and evaluation facility designed to support research and development work in advanced underwater weapons and weapons systems, weapon launchers, UUVs and oceanographic equipment.

The ANTX opening ceremony is today, with the ANTX Exercises run tomorrow. Ahead of the event, Sonardyne collaborated with the BAE Systems’ UUV team and navy divers to test its Sentinel IDS system.

Dan Zatezalo, Technical Sales Manager, manager – US Maritime and Defense - Sonardyne, said: “ANTX is a great event for collaboration. Not only have we had US Navy divers swimming against our Sentinel IDS system, but also BAE Systems put its Riptide vehicle in the water. This let us collect some really good data which we have already used to further improve our Sentinel algorithms for detecting UUVs.

“This year’s theme at ANTX is ‘Prepare for Battle: Undersea Security’ and that’s exactly what we offer. We have the tools for navies, defence and security organisations to do just that. With the ability to detect targets at ranges of up to 1,500 m, Sentinel takes reliable, long-range underwater intruder detection to a new level.”