Latest news with #KimJørgensen
Euronews
25-06-2025
- Business
- Euronews
This crewless ship is defending Denmark's and NATO's waters
As maritime tensions have increased since Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Denmark is investing big in defence tech. The Danish Armed Forces has announced it is deploying four uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs), dubbed 'Voyagers,' to boost surveillance capacity in under-monitored waters. They will be patrolling in Danish and NATO waters in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea for three months, according to the Danish Armed Forces. 'The security situation in the Baltic is tense, and therefore it has been decided by Danish parliament and the Danish government to improve the capabilities of Danish defence, and this includes the maritime domain and of course this includes our maritime domain awareness,' said Kim Jørgensen, the director of the Danish National Armaments. Powered by solar and wind energy, they can operate autonomously for months at sea. Drones are mounted on these 10-meter-long vessels and artificial intelligence (AI) helps analyse data of the surrounding environment under and above the surface of the ocean using advanced sensors. "So, the vehicles [work] like a truck. The truck carries the sensors and we use on-board sophisticated machine learning and AI to fuse that data to give us a full picture of what's above and below the surface," said Richard Jenkins, the founder and CEO of Saildrone, the company that makes the ships. The firm said the autonomous sailboats can support operations such as illegal fishing detection, border enforcement, and strategic asset protection. Denmark invests big in defence According to a report published in 2024 from the Export and Investment Fund of Denmark, EIFO, one of the country's investment agendas lies in defence in light of the new geopolitical landscape. The unmanned surface vehicles were purchased through a $60 million (€51,70 million) investment round led by EIFO. The four Voyagers will be first in operation for a three-month trial, as Denmark and NATO allies aim at extending maritime presence, especially around critical undersea infrastructure such as fibre optic cables and power lines. NATO and its allies have increased sea patrolling following several incidents, such as the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage in 2022, the Balticconnector gas pipeline burst in 2023, and undersea cable damage in the Baltic Sea in 2024. Its developer, Saildrone, is establishing its European headquarters and operational hub in Denmark's capital, Copenhagen. The American company says the new subsidiary will be the hub for all European operations. For more on this story, watch the video in the media player above.
The Star
17-06-2025
- Business
- The Star
Danish military using robotic sailboats for surveillance in Baltic and North seas
A Saildrone 'Voyager', uncrewed surface vehicle (USV), is moored at the Koge Marina in Koge, eastern Denmark, on June 16, 2025. — AP KOGE MARINA, Denmark: From a distance they look almost like ordinary sailboats, their sails emblazoned with the red-and-white flag of Denmark. But these 10-meter (30-foot)-long vessels carry no crew and are designed for surveillance. Four uncrewed robotic sailboats, known as "Voyagers,' have been put into service by Denmark's armed forces for a three-month operational trial. Built by Alameda, California-based company Saildrone, the vessels will patrol Danish and NATO waters in the Baltic and North Seas, where maritime tensions and suspected sabotage have escalated sharply since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb 24, 2022. Two of the Voyagers launched Monday from Koge Marina, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the Danish capital, Copenhagen. Powered by wind and solar energy, these sea drones can operate autonomously for months at sea. Saildrone says the vessels carry advanced sensor suites – radar, infrared and optical cameras, sonar and acoustic monitoring. Their launch comes after two others already joined a NATO patrol on June 6. Saildrone founder and CEO Richard Jenkins compared the vessels to a "truck' that carries sensors and uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to give a "full picture of what's above and below the surface" to about 20 to 30 miles (30 to 50 kilometers) in the open ocean. He said that maritime threats like damage to undersea cables, illegal fishing and the smuggling of people, weapons and drugs are going undetected simply because "no one's observing it.' Saildrone, he said, is "going to places... where we previously didn't have eyes and ears.' The Danish Defense Ministry says the trial is aimed at boosting surveillance capacity in under-monitored waters, especially around critical undersea infrastructure such as fiber-optic cables and power lines. "The security situation in the Baltic is tense,' said Lt. Gen. Kim Jørgensen, the director of Danish National Armaments at the ministry. "They're going to cruise Danish waters, and then later they're going to join up with the two that are on (the) NATO exercise. And then they'll move from area to area within the Danish waters." The trial comes as NATO confronts a wave of damage to maritime infrastructure - including the 2022 Nord Stream pipeline explosions and the rupture of at least 11 undersea cables since late 2023. The most recent incident, in January, severed a fiber-optic link between Latvia and Sweden's Gotland island. The trial also unfolds against a backdrop of trans-Atlantic friction – with US President Donald Trump's administration threatening to seize Greenland, a semiautonomous territory belonging to Denmark, a NATO member. Trump has said he wouldn't rule out military force to take Greenland. Jenkins, the founder of Saildrone, noted that his company had already planned to open its operation in Denmark before Trump was reelected. He didn't want to comment on the Greenland matter, insisting the company isn't political. Some of the maritime disruptions have been blamed on Russia's so-called shadow fleet – ageing oil tankers operating under opaque ownership to avoid sanctions. One such vessel, the Eagle S, was seized by Finnish police in December for allegedly damaging a power cable between Finland and Estonia with its anchor. Western officials accuse Russia of being behind a string of hybrid war attacks on land and at sea. Amid these concerns, NATO is moving to build a layered maritime surveillance system combining uncrewed surface vehicles like the Voyagers with traditional naval ships, satellites and seabed sensors. "The challenge is that you basically need to be on the water all the time, and it's humongously expensive," said Peter Viggo Jakobsen of the Royal Danish Defense College. "It's simply too expensive for us to have a warship trailing every single Russian ship, be it a warship or a civilian freighter of some kind.' "We're trying to put together a layered system that will enable us to keep constant monitoring of potential threats, but at a much cheaper level than before,' he added. – AP
