U.S. Marines Test Unmanned Amphibious Vehicle to Detect and Clear Beach Mines.

The U.S. Marine Corps has revealed imagery from Technical Concept Experiment 25.2 showing an unmanned swarming amphibious craft tested at Camp Pendleton, California, for surf zone mine and IED detection. The experiment signals a growing Marine Corps push to use unmanned systems to reduce risk during amphibious landings and contested beach operations.

The U.S. Marine Corps is testing a new unmanned amphibious capability designed to tackle one of the most dangerous phases of amphibious operations, the surf zone. Imagery shows an Unmanned Swarming Amphibious Craft staged at Red Beach on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton during Technical Concept Experiment 25.2, a two-week Office of Naval Research-sponsored event focused on mine and improvised explosive device detection, marking, and reporting.
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Unmanned tracked amphibious craft for surf zone operations, using swarming and remote control to detect, mark and report mines, opening safer beach lanes for Marines (Picture source: U.S. DoW).

Review of the high-resolution photos suggests the vehicle is best understood as a compact tracked unmanned craft optimized for the surf zone transition, not a traditional unmanned surface vessel. Visible features include pronounced flotation aids, multiple antennas, and a flat deck area that appears intended for modular payloads, lane marking stores, or small logistics loads rather than troop transport. Independent reporting based on the same imagery describes a remote control architecture supported by satellite communications, implying the craft can be supervised beyond line of sight from a ship, an operations center ashore, or a distributed expeditionary node. No weapons are apparent in the released configuration, reinforcing that the demonstrated emphasis was mobility, command and control, and sensor carriage in a saltwater environment that routinely punishes electronics and drivetrains.

In a beach assault or littoral insertion, mines and improvised explosive devices compress decision time and funnel vehicles into predictable lanes. A tracked amphibious UGV that can move from water to sand, carry detection payloads, and share data in near real time offers commanders a way to probe, map, and mark routes while keeping assault elements dispersed and harder to target. The “swarming” label matters here. A single unmanned craft is useful, but multiple coordinated craft can widen the searched area, create redundant communications relays, and sustain lane marking even if one vehicle is disabled by surf, obstacles, or hostile fire.

What is new is not merely that the Marines are testing another robot, but that this one targets the seam between sea and land where many unmanned systems still fail. Compared with manned amphibious combat vehicles like the legacy Assault Amphibious Vehicle and the newer Amphibious Combat Vehicle, this craft is not trying to be an armored maneuver. Instead, it is trying to make armored maneuver possible by reducing uncertainty in the surf and beach zone and by pushing detection and reporting forward. Compared with land-based UGV logistics mules, including systems the Marines have evaluated alongside the Army’s Small Multipurpose Equipment Transport concept, the difference is the amphibious transition and the apparent focus on explosive hazard defeat tasks tied to the beachhead problem set.

Developmentally, TCE 25.2 fits a recognizable ONR pattern: rapid field exposure, data capture, algorithm refinement, and then a hard decision about whether a capability is mature enough to transition. In earlier ONR coverage of the Technical Concept Experiment series, officials emphasized testing sensors and autonomy in realistic conditions of saltwater, dust, and operator feedback, precisely the environment that breaks lab-grade prototypes. ONR has also highlighted how expeditionary advanced base operations drive demand for faster, safer explosive hazard detection and defeat from deep water through the beach zone. Industry breadcrumbs point to a longer lineage as well. A U.S. government SBIR portfolio entry for PacMar Technologies references prior design and construction work on an Unmanned Swarming Amphibious Craft and the Ultra Heavy Amphibious Connector concept, underscoring that multiple amphibious unmanned prototypes have been in circulation for years and are now being pulled into more operationally framed experiments.

Because imagery was cleared for public release, the simplest read is that the demonstration produced usable results and did not embarrass the sponsors. The next steps are the minefield lane drills with increasing complexity, harsher sea states, longer endurance runs, and tighter integration with the sensor stack and reporting tools Marines actually carry. ONR’s recent work at prior TCE iterations has stressed fusing data into common user interfaces, including ATAK displays, so a logical progression is a more complete kill chain from detection to marking to neutralization support. If that integration holds, the Marine Corps gains a scalable way to shape a landing area, protect high-value amphibious platforms, and extend contested littoral logistics without putting the first wave inside a minefield.