How Ukraine’s bomb-disposal robots could help the US open the Strait of Hormuz

KYIV, Ukraine – The TLK-150 is 8 meters long, weighs 50 pounds and dives just below the Black Sea to locate underground mine sites. Submerged underwater, its rotors can travel more than 1,200 miles before needing to be recharged.

The seaplane, manufactured by Ukrainian defense company Toloka, has flown hundreds of missions off the coast of Ukraine, searching for mines that were laid underwater during the Russian invasion. Now, its services may be needed in a different commercial waterway.

I The Strait of Hormuz has remained completely closed to shipping since Iran dropped mines across it in March. Until the fireworks are finished, 20% of the world’s energy usually passes through the road it may stay still. The process could take months, experts say, since the US does not have the necessary domestic equipment to turn on the current.

“The US Navy has been ignoring mine warfare for over 20 years. It’s a job that gets very little attention, very little respect,” said Scott Savitz, a senior engineer at the Rand Corporation, who once advised the US Navy’s mine warfare command.

The Pentagon told CBS News: “The US military is dealing with the dangers of landmines using unmanned capabilities to ensure safe passage through the problem.”

Ukraine, on the other hand, has more recent experience in bombing than any other country. Starting in 2022, Russia has dropped thousands of mines across the Black Sea, predicting the blockade of Iran’s Hormuz by using underwater explosives to prevent ships from docking at Black Sea ports in Ukraine.

Initially, Ukraine relied on divers to remove explosives, but in four years it has developed new solutions such as the TLK-150.

“Without a doubt, Ukraine is at the cutting edge of the mining world. The technology being developed here will change the way demining is done,” Ed Crowther, a United Nations Development Program mine advisor in Ukraine, told CBS News.

But before you can remove the mines, you need to find them, and experts say that the latter are often trickier than the former.

“One of the most difficult questions is finding the mines in the first place,” Emma Salisbury, a maritime security expert at the Royal Navy Strategic Studies Centre, told CBS News. “If you’re using a GPS connection on a mine sweeper, that can easily get jammed. And once you’ve got them, how do you transmit this data back?”

The US has limited capacity to destroy the bombs, experts say

In the Strait of Hormuz, the US relies on the Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship to locate Iranian mines. Ships deploy helicopters and drones at sea that use lasers and sonar to detect mines. But the ships themselves are limited in how much land they can cover. The Navy only has two active in the Middle East, and the ironclad ships have to stay away from minefields for fear of triggering them.

“There have been questions that have been raised from the beginning by the mining community, looking at how a ship that could not enter the mining area because it was made of steel will be able to map the areas in the mines,” said Savitz. “You have to keep the ship well away from any potential mining sites, and that puts a strain on the scope of the mission.”

Maritime drones that ships transport may also face challenges in this regard. The Littoral Combat Ship uses unmanned systems from American manufacturers such as General Dynamics and RTX. Some of their drones are the Ukrainian TLK-150, which travels underwater using sonar and cameras to map waterways and target mines.

But they are imperfect tools. During a mine-sweeping exercise in the Black Sea last year, western UAVs failed to operate in a Ukrainian war zone, according to two people familiar with the incident.

“Two UAVs appeared, then the air raid started, the GPS jammers were activated, the cars reached the top, they lost their GPS and their batteries ran out,” said another witness. “It’s very different from the military environment.”

Ukrainian naval aircraft are designed to withstand these wartime challenges. The TLK-150 is the smallest of the four models produced by the Ukrainian defense company Toloka. They act as naval strike drones in addition to minesweepers, using new technology to travel further than other maritime drones, transmitting what they see simultaneously.

The founder of this company, Dima Zelenskiy, said that this makes them more effective in mapping underwater mines than all other types.

“Using standard methods, you need to take the car out of the water and connect the USB to the drone to get the data,” said Zelenskiy. “For us, the car does everything. When it sees mines, it transmits the information. You don’t have to spend extra days or weeks getting cars out.”

Ukrainian technology is resistant to jamming

The innovation Zelenskiy said is most important for operating in a wartime environment is his system’s resistance to electronic jamming. The Ukrainian battlefield is the world’s most challenging electronic warfare environment, with Russia and Ukraine deploying extensive electronic jamming systems. Even the most advanced Western aircraft often fail tests in the country as their signals are congested.

The TLK-150 solves this problem by using artificial intelligence identification tools to know where it is without relying on GPS connectivity. The same technology, developed by Ukrainian defense company Sine Engineering, recently received a $70 million investment from the US Development Finance Corporation, the international development arm of the Trump administration.

This technology could prove useful in the Strait of Hormuz if Iran were to use electronic warfare against minesweepers.

“The Iranians may not be as sophisticated as the Russians in electronic warfare, but GPS jamming is a really simple task. You just have to generate a signal stronger than that of the satellites,” said Savitz.

Ukrainian technology is unlikely to be used immediately in this crisis, however, as the US military’s acquisition program is not designed to last.

“When someone has a gadget that they bring into the US procurement process, then it goes through a long series of processes, including testing and testing of various types and going back and forth,” Savitz said. “And, ultimately, that system is imported into the US and purchased for use, which is probably why we don’t include this novel technology.”

However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv is still ready to help if the Pentagon asks.

“We raised this issue, because it is painful and urgent – as we all see, in the whole world. There is a problem of energy. They know that they can count on our technology in this area, and we discussed in detail,” said Zelenskyy in March, adding a week later to X, “We can share this technology with other countries, but no one asked us to come and help with the Hormuz Strait.”