Arma Craft Marine Defence is a Swedish-Emirati company that is producing boats from 7.5 meter up to 18 meters including patrol, rescue and combat boats as well as interceptor and landing crafts.
The Trident MK II CDDC is a vessel produced in the UAE, dedicated to covert operations for special forces. It is designed to insert and extract combat diver units in hostile environments but can perform other missions like intelligence gathering or mine countermeasure operations.
This vessel has the particularity to combine the capacity to navigate in three different modes, on the surface, semi-submerged and fully submerged. The motors are functioning with diesel, diesel or electric and electric, respectively. The change of navigation mode can be done with no change in pilot handling. It has the capacity to be airlifted airlifted.
The CDDC is 11 meters long and weighs 6.6 tonnes and can embark 12 combat divers including the pilots. In addition to the main compartment, there is a wet one for supplies, spare parts or extra fuel packs and battery modules.
Onboard, a rebreather system is installed to be used when diver is seated in the craft. Standard setup is oxygen for 8 hours and can be extended up to 16 hours.
Arma Craft claims the Trident MK II can reach a top speed of 40 knots while surfaced. The reported range is significant as well, with over 300 nautical miles while surfaced and over 30 nautical miles while dived. The propulsion system for submerged operations is quite unique with two hub-less 32kW Rim Driven Thrusters (RDT). For on the surface propulsion Trident uses a 500-horsepower diesel engine with a waterjet. The craft can operate at a maximum depth of 40 meters.
“This an underwater delivery vessel that can reach top a speed of 40 knots on the surface and 6 knots underwater. It has a range of 300 nautical miles on the surface and about 30 submerged.”
Thomas Jakobsson, International Sales at Arma Craft.
To stay stealthy, cameras are installed on the top of the mast to get a 360 degrees view. Trident is also equipped with a sonar so the operator can detect objects that the optics might not see.
Regarding its weapon systems, the craft has a NATO mount that can be adapted for a variety of guns including GATLING type / minigun. There are not yet armament integrated that can be used while the craft is submerged.
“For submerged mode, we are working with a European defense company to integrate light torpedoes, in case the client would require this option.”
Thomas Jakobsson, International Sales at Arma Craft.
Naval News understands that this defense company is Italy’s Leonardo with its Black Scorpion mini torpedo.
The Trident MkII has the capacity to be remotely controlled. Indeed, it can be sent to any coordinate and then dive down to a predefined depth and hold its position where divers can take over the control.
Arma Craft announced earlier this year the first customer of the Trident MkII, with an order for 12 craft. We learned at DEFEA that the launch customer is located in South East Asia.
