HII tests REMUS 620 UUV for US Navy’s mission

Uncrewed Systems, a business unit of HII’s Mission Technologies, has tested the next-generation medium-class unmanned underwater vehicle (MUUV), the REMUS 620, on the US Navy’s confidence course.

After shipping the vehicle from the factory in Pocasset, Massachusetts, to Keyport, Washington, the vehicle successfully underwent the full range of pre-mission checks and ballasting.

“Getting a chance to put our newest design through its paces on the Navy’s UUV confidence course was a great opportunity for us to validate our design improvements to the vehicle. We also gained a lot of valuable operational data using the KRAKEN MINSAS 120,” remarked Adrian Gonsalves, REMUS 620 product manager. 

“The confidence course provided us a great benchmark we can use to continue our improvements to this great design and gave us a chance to show UUV sailors in Keyport how much improvement we built into this next gen MUUV in terms of modularity and maintainability.”  

According to HII, this is the first utilization of the US Navy’s confidence course by an industry-provided MUUV and highlights the partnership between the Unmanned Undersea Vehicles Group ONE (UUVGRU-1) and industry.

The course was established to provide repeatable and comparable performance data for accelerated capability development in support of Chief of Naval Operations’ NAVPLAN Project 33 and submarine force objectives focused on enhancing warfighting readiness. 

Unveiled in 2022, the REMUS 620 has a battery life of up to 110 hours and a range of 275 nautical miles, providing capabilities for mine countermeasures, hydrographic surveys, intelligence collection, surveillance, and electronic warfare.

The REMUS 620 achieved two significant development milestones in 2023, with a successful in-water test in October and the first sea test in December. In November 2022, HII unveiled the design of the new UUV.

In March 2024, HII received an order for the REMUS 620 UUV from an international client in the Indo-Pacific Region. Earlier on, in August 2023, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced the order of two REMUS 620 UUVs for higher-resolution mapping of the Gulf of Mexico.