Page 6 - Australian Defence Mag Sep 2020

6 NEWS REVIEW INDUSTRY UPDATE
SEPTEMBER 2020 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
NUSHIP SUPPLY COMPLETES SEA TRIALS KATHERINE ZIESING | CANBERRA
ADM can confirm that NUSHIP Supply has completed sea trials off the coast of Ferrol, Spain where she was built. The first of the two new Supply class ships (with Stalwart already in the water as well) was launched in November 2018 but thanks to COVID delays in particular, has seen some slippage in the original sea tri- als schedule.
Staff from Teekay, Navantia and the RAN were on board during these trials. Supply started her voyage to Australia in August to undergo further testing with the RAN before acceptance into the fleet later this year.
In 2016 Navantia was awarded the con- tract to build two auxiliary oiler replenish- ment ships (AORs). These ships will re- place existing vessels HMA Ships Success and Sirius and will be known as the Supply Class. The AORs will provide operational support to the Navy’s fleet by providing fuel, ammunition and stores.
The contract to build
these vessels was awarded
in 2016 with both ships
due to be delivered in
2020. The design of these
vessels is based on the Na-
vantia built and designed,
Spanish oiler Cantabria
(which the RAN had on
loan for a 13-month pe-
riod earlier this decade)
that is currently operated
by the Spanish Navy. The
Australian AORs are de-
signed with the intent to
replenish fuels, dry cargo,
water, food, ammunition,
equipment and spare parts to the opera- tional deployments of the Australian na- val and combat forces operating far from port, on the high seas for longer periods. HMA Ships Supply and Stalwart are due to commence service with the RAN from
ABOVE: NUSHIP Supply has commenced sea trials off the coast of Ferrol, Spain.
BOEING COMPLETES AUTONOMOUS FLIGHT TEST TRIFECTA
mid-2020 and are expected to remain in service for a minimum of 25 years.
The commissioning crew of NUSHIP Sup- ply (II) donned ships hats and badges for the first time in January at Garden Island, Syd- ney with Captain Ben Hissink in command.
forming as intended, and it is a huge credit to our technical team, along with our sup- pliers RFDesigns who supported the flight mission on-site in Tara.”
The Autonomous Systems Platform Tech- nology Project is Boeing’s second Advance Queensland investment partnership with the Queensland Government. Boeing and its partners are developing new on-board autonomous command and control technol- ogy to enable unmanned vehicles to perceive, process, communicate and act in accordance with their programmed mission – without in- put from a human operator. Boeing will con- tinue flight tests for the project in Cloncurry.
The technology developed as part of this project is informing Boeing’s development autonomous aircraft, including the Boeing Airpower Teaming System, also known as Loyal Wingman.
BOEING has conducted an end-to-end flight mission using three high performance test beds in outback Queensland, marking an- other successful milestone for the Autono- mous Systems Platform Technology Project.
“The goal of our mission was to com- pletely test out our mission system soft- ware from start to finish, using three high performance jets,” Emily Hughes, director
LEFT: The technology developed as part of this project is informing the Loyal Wingman program.
of Boeing’s Phantom Works Inter- national, said.
During the flight, Boeing Austra- lia successfully performed a num- ber of tests, including the three jets taking off autonomously, achiev- ing the required in air formations, departing from the formation and
each autonomously landing.
“While we have previously flown larger
numbers aircraft autonomously, this was our first opportunity to perform an end- to-end mission test with three high perfor- mance test bed aircraft, at speeds of up to 200 kilometres per hour,” Hughes said.
“The test returned pleasing results, demonstrating our mission system is per-
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