US Coast Guard Pulls Six Saildrone Autonomous Boats From Great Lakes for Winter
The US Coast Guard has withdrawn six uncrewed Saildrone Voyager boats from the Great Lakes after its first test season and plans to return them in spring 2027. Questions remain over data retention and how the boats identify themselves.
The US Coast Guard is removing six uncrewed Saildrone Voyager surface vessels from the Great Lakes, on the border with Canada, ahead of winter ice. The agency announced the end of its first autonomous patrol season on November 9 and said the roughly 10-meter boats will return for a second test period in spring 2027.
The boats operated from April through November, although the Great Lakes District had described a May-to-October deployment in May. They sent weather data, radar tracks and photographs to Coast Guard command centers. They measured wind speed, wave height, water temperature and barometric pressure for search and rescue crews, and watched recreational and commercial traffic across lakes covering about 243,000 square kilometers. Each boat is mainly wind-driven, with solar power for its electronics and a 4-kilowatt auxiliary motor. It carries radar, an AIS transceiver, weather instruments and an optical camera. Human operators pilot them around the clock from control centers in three time zones.
Saildrone's contract with the Coast Guard, signed in March, is worth $15.5 million and covers 16 boats split between the Great Lakes and the Northeast coast.
Questions about data and transparency
The Coast Guard says it alone may use the data, keeps the rights after the contract ends, and bars Saildrone from selling or sharing it. It says the cameras take periodic still photographs, record no continuous video and use no facial recognition. The release does not say how long or where the photographs are stored. Michael Zimmer, director of Marquette University's Center for Data Ethics, raised those questions and warned of possible function creep over time.
The release lists no enforcement results from the season. According to Wisconsin Public Radio, the agency said no wrongdoing or suspected wrongdoing had been identified in the first six months. On the MarineTraffic ship-tracking site, the boats are classified as pleasure craft and do not clearly identify as Coast Guard vessels.
Mike Bradley, mayor of Sarnia, Ontario, told CBC he learned of the program from journalists. The Coast Guard says Canadian authorities are aware of it and that it does not alter cooperation with the Canadian Coast Guard and the RCMP.
