Inside the U.S. Navy's Cutting-Edge Drone Boat Tech

Drone boats appear to be on the cusp of a revolution.

The U.S. Navy’s Task Force 59 has been pairing cutting-edge unmanned surface vehicles with artificial intelligence to expand the military’s eyes and ears in the Middle East. Now, similar efforts will be rolled out in the Pacific and Central and South America.

The military’s objective is to leverage machine learning to detect and anticipate threats before they occur. Experts say the U.S. is currently the leader in this field, but competitors like China and Russia are racing to catch up.

I traveled to Manama, Bahrain to see the high-tech drones in action and speak to officials about how they’re preparing for a future with robots in the world’s waters.

0:00 A rare look at the U.S. Navy’s drone boat operation
0:30 Meet the Navy’s Task Force 59
2:14 Drone boat capabilities
4:05 How artificial intelligence is layered with the drone boats
5:11 The global race to advance unmanned marine vehicles
7:23 What’s next for the U.S. military?

I’m Shelby Holliday, a reporter for WSJ. Subscribe to join me as I explain some of today's most pressing geopolitical events, from superpower showdowns and conflicts to supply chain snarls and natural resource struggles.

#Navy #Drones #ShelbyHolliday

[petertimowreef]

My favourite part was the drone-in-a-box. Such a versatile tool, you can strap one or more to pretty much anything and turn it into a drone mothership. Even a regular civilian speedboat!

[snowjammma]

The anticipated environment sounds like something from Minority Report

[ThangTran-bjwe]

What is US coastguard doing in the Persian Golf ?

[jaredspencer]

4:05 "Welcome to The Rock." He really missed the opportunity to say this in a Sean Connery voice.

[abdulwasesyed]

All i have to say that this is awesome.

[XAirForcedotcom]

Hey Brad, I love your transit case that opens itself up so the drone can stay protected. DJI already built a garage for theirs.

[Toroleco]

GAMECHANGER brand ! send them to ukraine!

[mpozad]

Shelby is so inappropriate for military subject matter, in both the technical and presentation aspects. She should cover runway fashion.

[noidontthinksolol]

3:09 bro .... is that the actual camera footage ? 😂

[frankfreeman]

You MUST put self-destruct in those things!

[DavidGarcia-fcwf]

Make a stealth high speed kamakazi drone full of explosives that converts into a sub and submerges right before its attack!

[crusaderanimation]

3:11 Dawg i heard you like drones so we put drones in drones so you could drones when drones.

[mustafafethiorhan]

If we are going to make the wars with unmanned machines in the future the solution is basic. Just force two generals in a chess match whoever wins has won the battle.

[busterhyman]

Hey can you give us the plans and it technical info also, so we can defeat them ! Loud mouths sinks ships !!

[johnv.]

Someone needs to add mannequins to the top of these boats and just troll the heck out of the S&R Recon air units

[ThomasRomero-gmkd]

Wonderful new weaponry US keep on going

[jaridkeen]

Kinda dumb they dont have a self destruct mode if captured so Iran doesnt get a free drone boat

[balporsugu.]

Turkish IDA's(Unmanned Surface Vehicles) are the best. Ulaq, Marlin, Albatros, Sancar, Mir, Salvo...

[Davethreshold]

GOD, I LOVE this stuff!! Thank you, WSJ, and Shelby Holliday!
❤🤍💙

[Anomize]

Somewhere out there these drones are going to find something that doesn’t belong on this planet. And i mean something that’s been hidden in our oceans that doesn’t want to be found. Now would the public be shown? That’s another story. What other places on this planet can you hide? Kinda like godzilla himself hiding 😂