Knifefish SMCM UUV
Galería
Descripción general
U.S. Navy medium-class autonomous minehunting UUV based on the Bluefin-21 and designed to find buried and difficult mines while ships remain outside the minefield.
Knifefish is the U.S. Navy's medium-class Surface Mine Countermeasure UUV for detecting and classifying mines, including buried targets that challenge conventional high-frequency sonar. General Dynamics Mission Systems developed the open-architecture system from the 4.93 m Bluefin-21 vehicle and delivered the first production system to the Navy in 2021. Knifefish operates as an off-board autonomous sensor so a littoral combat ship or other vessel of opportunity can remain outside the minefield. Because Knifefish-specific speed, endurance, depth, and range are not consistently published in current official material, the record does not simply copy every commercial Bluefin-21 performance value.
Roles principales
Notas
General Dynamics confirms Knifefish is a specialised Bluefin-21 derivative and prime-contractor program. The 4.93 m length uses the official base-vehicle dimension; performance values are left null where the Navy has not published Knifefish-specific figures.
