Navy awards several contracts focused on LCS mine countermeasures

The Navy has awarded various contracts relating to the Independence-variant Littoral Combat Ship’s mine countermeasures mission package, all preceding an anticipated rollout of the package on the LCS later this fiscal year.

The first contract to Bollinger Shipyards for $7.7 million will go toward advanced material for an MCM unmanned surface vehicle -- expected to be completed by September, the Navy news release stated.

Raytheon will receive over $18 million to produce five Minehunt Payload Delivery Systems by the end of fiscal year 2026. Finally, Textron Systems received a little over $12 million to produce four Minesweep Payload Delivery Systems, set to deliver by early FY-27.

Both payloads operate from the USV, and the MH PDS uses AN/AQS-20 sonar to hunt mines, while MS PDS implements acoustic and magnetic minesweeping.

“With the first deliveries of the MCM MP underway and deployments closely following, it is critical to ensure we have the contracts in place to procure and deliver the quantity of mission packages to the fleet required in today’s changing world,” Capt. Matthew Lehmann, LCS mission modules program manager, said in a statement.

Capt. JJ Murawski, program manager for the small combatant and expeditionary modernization and sustainment office, confirmed in January that the MCM mission package will be implemented on the LCS later this fiscal year -- calling the rollout a “generational change.”

“Both LCS variants -- you're going to see the Navy significantly investing in increasing the value and survivability of those ship classes and the readiness compared to what I think we've seen historically,” Murawski said at the Surface Navy Association’s conference. “It's a huge effort again, new systems and crews that have not used these before.”

The first MCM mission package was put onboard the Canberra (LCS-30) last April, and the crew has spent time since then training and performing maintenance. The use of mission packages on Independence variants is a departure from the Navy’s traditional use of MH-53 helicopters and Avenger-class MCM ships for similar efforts.