Hell bay trials: A multinational collaborative marine autonomy field experimentation program

As part of The Technical Cooperation Program (TTCP), a series of trials has been held over the past three years to focus on collaboration in the unmanned maritime systems environment between the following nations: Australia (AS), Canada (CA), New Zealand (NZ), the United Kingdom (UK), and the United States (US). The trials have taken place in San Diego, CA US, Patuxent River, MA US, and Portsmouth, UK. This paper will review the objectives and results of the trials which include: Automatic Target Recognition (ATR) evaluations, collaborative search-classify-map missions (SCM) between two vehicles, and squad based collaboration between underwater and surface vehicles. The upcoming fourth trial (Hell Bay IV) being held in Lochalsh, Scotland, UK in October of this year will also be discussed.