Navy Issues Request for Proposals for Medium Unmanned Underwater Vehicle

A Knifefish medium-class unmanned undersea vehicle training model undergoes crane operations aboard the Military Sealift Command expeditionary fast transport vessel USNS Spearhead (T-EPF 1) in July 2019. U.S. NAVY / Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Anderson W. Branch

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy released a request for proposals for the design, development, test and production of the Medium Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (MUUV) May 21, the Program Executive Office Unmanned and Small Combatants (PEO USC) said in a May 22 release. The solicitation will support the next generation of the PEO USC’s Unmanned Maritime Systems Program Office’s Razorback Unmanned Underwater Vehicle and the Naval Sea Systems Command Expeditionary Missions Program Office’s Maritime Expeditionary Mine Countermeasures UUV (MEMUUV) system. 

The MUUV will be a modular, open-systems and open-architecture UUV. In the Razorback Torpedo Tube Launch & Recovery (TTL&R) configuration, it will provide submarine-based autonomous oceanographic sensing and data collection in support of intelligence preparation of the operational environment. In the MEMUUV configuration, it will provide persistent surface-launched-and-recovered mine countermeasures. 

The notional MUUV will contain a common baseline vehicle architecture, including sensors and components, for the submarine and expeditionary configurations. Launch-and-recovery systems will reflect each configuration’s unique requirements and missions.  

The MEMUUV is designed for launch from Navy and Marine Corps surface vessels, vessels of opportunity or land-based forward operating bases. The Razorback derives from the Navy’s submarine-launched Littoral Battlespace Sensing Autonomous Undersea Vehicle (Submarine) effort which has two deployment configurations: Dry Deck Shelter and TTL&R. Only TTL&R variants are included in the current solicitation. 

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