Flying drone – weapons for submarines

Option MQ-9B SkyGuardian is mainly designed for land-based operations, while the MQ-9B SeaGuardian is simply a marine version, adapted to patrol the waters and combat submarines (ZOPs). SeaGuardian has been tested as a ZOP strategy utilizing sonar buoys for respective years. However, so far it has been presented with 2 SDS (Sonobuoy Dispensing System). On the latest materials from the exhibition Canada Security’26 (CANSEC) you can see SeaGuardian with 4 attached SDS tanks.

In practice, this means that MQ-9B can simultaneously carry twice as many sonar buoys as previously and build extended fields of acoustic reflection at sea. Each SDS tray can hold 10–20 buoys (depending on the type), which in full configuration gives the anticipation to deploy a very large number of sensors (40–80 buoys) in 1 flight, and thus make a network of detection submarines in real time. The maximum burden capacity of MQ-9B SeaGuardian alleged payload (sensors, communication trays, SDSs, sonar buoys) is about 2155 kg, of which the weight of 1 full SDS tray (approximately 4 m long) can be up to 340 kg.

Parallel to the improvement of MQ-9B SeaGuardian capabilities as a ZOP platform, integration tests of various types of sonar buoys, including passive DIFAR, active DICASS and modern multistatic MAC buoys, are ongoing, which let for more advanced signal processing and more effective detection of submarines in large areas with less sensors. It is besides crucial that SeaGuardian acts not only as a "drop platform", but besides as a data processing node that combines information from many buoys and transmits it in real time to command systems.

MQ-9B over Europe

In the Polish context these changes fit into a broader image of the modernization of the designation system. Poland signed in 2024 contract to acquisition MQ-9B SkyGuardian under the Zefir program, which means the introduction of a fresh generation of unmanned platforms capable of long-term designation of ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance – recognition, reflection and intelligence) and operations in a network-centric environment. Although Poland will receive a SkyGuardian version optimised to operate over the mainland alternatively than SeaGuardian, the improvement of this second variant is of direct operational importance. It shows the direction of evolution of the full MQ-9B household towards integration with maritime missions and combating underwater threats.

As a result, MQ-9B becomes not only a reconnaissance platform, but part of a wider NATO concept in which unmanned, patrol aircraft and ships co-create a common image of the situation at sea. For the Baltic region, this means the anticipation of building a more flexible and multilayered maritime surveillance system, in which drones play the function of mobile "sensor spreaders" and reenforce situation awareness in 1 of the most susceptible European waters. What is crucial for our region, the MQ-9B SeaGuardian platforms will benefit from the German Navy (the beginning of the supply of 8 unmanneds in 2028). Denmark and Belgium have already decided to acquisition SkyGuardians in addition to Poland. Among European MQ-9B users is besides the UK with drones in the exploratory-hit version Protector RG Mk1 (British SkyGuardian variant).

Poland is expected to receive MQ-9B SkyGuardian drones purchased for PLN 1.2 billion at the latest in the first 4th of 2027. MQ-9B strategy will replace presently utilized by Polish soldiers unmanned reconnaissance systems MQ-9A Reaper, which were delivered in February 2023 under a leasing agreement.