The robotic boat that helped pull US Army helicopter crew members from the waters near the Strait of Hormuz comes from a startup with big-money backing and possibly bigger ambitions. Saronic, founded in 2022 by former Navy SEAL Dino Mavrookas and three partners, built the drone vessel used on Tuesday—a 24-foot watercraft called the Corsair that can travel more than 1,000 nautical miles without a person on board, per the Wall Street Journal. The mission to save the crew of the Apache chopper that crashed on Monday marked one of the first real-world rescue operations for Task Force 59, the Navy unit focused on AI and unmanned systems that the AP notes was established in 2021.
The Corsair was used for this rescue mission due to its "proximity and capability factors," a US Central Command rep tells the New York Times. Saronic, now valued at $9.25 billion, has landed a $392 million Navy contract and a spot in the service's Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel program, per the Journal. Its lineup includes the Corsair, the larger Mirage, and the 180-foot Marauder, plus smaller electric boats, all designed to swap in various payloads and be run in swarms—up to 100 vessels per operator, according to the company. After starting with a hacked Amazon raft, Saronic has scaled up to 1,600 employees and facilities in the US, UK, and Australia. It's now searching for a site for a "Port Alpha" shipyard. The goal, says Mavrookas: Send robots, not people, into the riskiest situations.
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