The Austal USA shipyard launched something new this week: A sail-powered drone vessel that will conduct long-range unmanned missions for the U.S. Navy.

In the summer of 2022, Austal and Saildrone Inc. announced a partnership to build autonomous sail-powered survey vessels. Saildrone is a pioneer in the field, and its vessels have been gathering reams of data from inhospitable waters in recent years: They’ve circumnavigated the Southern Ocean and cruised through hurricanes while mapping the seafloor, gathering information on icebergs and monitoring climate conditions.

Saildrone’s Surveyor weighs about 15 tons and is about 65 feet long with a low-profile hull topped by a rigid sail. The company announced this week that the first aluminum Surveyor unmanned surface vehicle (USV) produced in Mobile was launched on Monday.

The U.S. Navy said that Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti and Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. Christopher J. Mahoney had gotten a look at the vessel Monday as they visited Austal and two Mississippi shipyards.

“Using unmanned assets helps put more players on the field by freeing up manned assets for more specific and important tasks,” Franchetti said in a Navy press release. “It’s good to see high tech industry partnering with the traditional shipbuilding industrial base to rapidly deliver cutting-edge products at scale.”

“I couldn’t agree more with the CNO when it comes to more players on the field,” said Mahoney. “We are at the brink of a new battlefield where uncrewed systems, at scale, will provide new levels of resilience and adaptability for our forces.”

According to information provided by Saildrone, Surveyors are “primarily designed for ocean mapping and maritime domain awareness.” They have solar panels and a diesel generator to power sensors including multibeam sonar that can map seafloor to depths of 11,000 meters.

Surveyors being built for the Navy also carry “purpose-built defense and security payloads for accurate, dynamic, and confident decisions and responses to the full spectrum of maritime threats and challenges,” according to Saildrone. “Upcoming Navy missions will focus on the ability of the Surveyor to deliver both surface and undersea intelligence for a range of high-priority applications, including anti-submarine warfare (ASW).”

“It is tremendous to see the first vehicle launched of many that will be produced here in Alabama,” Saildrone founder and CEO Richard Jenkins said in a statement released by the company. “We are honored to have Admiral Franchetti here in person to witness the start of the creation of a new fleet of USVs alongside traditional manned ships. Everyone at Saildrone is very proud to be supporting the US Navy and contributing to our defense and national security.”

Saildrone says Austal is producing a new Surveyor every six weeks, and that the first ones are “contracted to the US Navy for the initial testing and evaluation of Surveyor-class vehicles in multiple environments.”

Saildrone has promoted the Surveyor for use in a variety of “executable missions” including: illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing; pattern of life monitoring; law enforcement and maritime safety; Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS); counter-smuggling; border patrol; harbor security; guard vessel roles; sanction monitoring; range clearing; signals intelligence baselining; and ecosystem monitoring.