American largest military shipbuilder HII has marked a milestone in the production of ROMULUS unmanned surface vessels (USVs) for the US Navy during a ceremony in Louisiana.
The event included attaching a commemorative hull plaque to ROMULUS 151, the lead vessel in the unmanned surface vessel (USV) series. The milestone represents continued progress on HII’s production of ROMULUS USVs for the US Navy’s medium unmanned surface vessel (MUSV) program and honored the skilled workforce, regional shipbuilding partners and advanced manufacturing capabilities supporting construction of the vessels.
The US Navy recently awarded HII a contract to build 10 ROMULUS 151 vessels under the MUSV program.
“Louisiana is the powerhouse of the maritime industry, and today we solidified that legacy. Working with Breaux Brothers and HII, we are committed to ensuring the next generation of maritime technology is built by Louisiana hands on Louisiana soil," Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry said.
“Building and fielding the Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel is an essential tailored offset within the CNO’s Hedge Strategy, expanding distributed lethality, and maritime domain awareness across contested waters. Leveraging rapid commercial acquisition paths coupled with agile Fleet Introduction, we are integrating combat-ready autonomous capabilities into the Fleet to provide Combatant Commanders with asymmetric options…and we are going to do it fast," Vice Adm. Michael Wosje, deputy chief of naval operations for Warfighting Requirements and Capabilities.
ROMULUS is a modular family of AI-enabled USVs built on HII’s open-architecture Odyssey advanced autonomy solutions and designed to meet current and emerging requirements for the US Navy, US Marine Corps, joint forces, and allied partners.
The platform supports a wide range of missions, including intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR); mine countermeasures; strike operations; counter-unmanned systems; and the launch and recovery of unmanned underwater and aerial vehicles.