NATO Center Tests Wave Glider in ASW Exercise

An energy-efficient robotic vehicle debuts as a communications gateway of an experimental network developed by CMRE within the Proud Manta ‘13 framework.

The Antisubmarine Warfare (ASW) Exercise Proud Manta ‘13 (POMA ‘13), which includes participating ships and aircraft from ten NATO nations, will be held from 23 February to 6 March off the coast of Sicily. As in 2012, the 2013 POMA includes again major scientific tests during the exercise: scientists from the NATO Center for Maritime Research and Experimentation (CMRE) are testing technologies and software that they have been developed for detection and tracking of submarines in the marine environment. In particular CMRE performs experimentation with an autonomous ASW barrier to protect a shoreline asset using autonomous underwater and surface vehicles (AUVs and ASVs), with the Ocean Explorer AUV performing detections as in POMA ‘12, and the Wave Glider, a new wave-powered unmanned surface vehicle debuting here for the first time in a NATO ASW exercise, acting as a communications gateway. This exercise is an opportunity for CMRE to test ASW systems in a realistic scenario. It is also an occasion to see how new advances in research and technology, such as autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), can be applied to NATO missions in the future.

In the last two years, CMRE (formerly called NURC) participated in POMA ‘11 and ‘12 and gathered data in conjunction with the exercises, helping NATO plan their operations. The Center also monitored the test area with gliders prior to and during operations to measure oceanographic variables. Following those successful experiences, CMRE’s role in the exercise has been confirmed this year and includes two components: Multistatic ASW Experimentation using collaborative AUVs and ASVs, and tactical planning and exercise reconstruction using CMRE’s Multistatic Tactical Planning Aid (MSTPA) tool.

POMA ‘13 CMRE experiments are conducted from and supported by the 93-meter NATO Research Vessel Alliance.

www.cmre.nato.int