Australia Reveals Ghost Shark Uncrewed Submarines Will Carry 12 Sea Mines and Altius Drones

Australia has revealed that the Anduril Ghost Shark extra large autonomous underwater vehicle will carry sea mines, concealed supply caches and Altius drones, giving the first detailed account of what the Royal Australian Navy intends its uncrewed submarines to deliver against an adversary. Minister for Defence Industry Pat Conroy confirmed the payloads on October 19 at Anduril Australia’s factory in Sydney, where he stated that a single Ghost Shark can carry 12 deployable sea mines. The number of Altius drones each vehicle can launch was withheld on grounds of operational security. The disclosure marks a significant change in how the program is presented, with a vehicle previously described only in terms of surveillance, reconnaissance and strike tasks now tied to specific means of mining sea lanes and sustaining forces from beneath the surface.

The payloads were developed jointly by the Royal Australian Navy, the Defence Science and Technology Group, the Advanced Strategic Capabilities Accelerator and industry, and the government confirmed parallel work on the Speartooth uncrewed underwater vehicle and on the Bluebottle uncrewed surface vessel, which is to tow a thin line array sonar to detect submarines. Some of the payloads are being demonstrated at Exercise Maritime Big Play Pacific near San Diego, which runs from October 5 to 25 under the U.S. Pacific Fleet, the U.S. Marine Corps and Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific, following three years of payload trials with the AUKUS partners at earlier iterations of the exercise. Conroy described Ghost Shark as “a flagship Australian success story that showcases the ingenuity of our defence industry”, adding that the vehicles were now “rolling off the line at an increasing rate” less than a year after the factory opened.

The Australian government has committed up to A$5.8 billion over the coming decade to autonomous and uncrewed undersea warfare under its 2026 National Defence Strategy, including A$1.7 billion for a new fleet of Ghost Shark vehicles, with AUKUS defence ministers having named payloads for uncrewed undersea vehicles as the first Pillar 2 signature project in May. The investment reflects a navy that will wait until the early 2030s for its first nuclear powered attack submarines while Chinese naval activity in the region grows considerably, as highlighted when the carrier Liaoning sailed past Okinawa with two Type 055 class destroyers in mid-October. Japan has meanwhile continued to expand its own submarine fleet, and Anduril has tested uncrewed combat aircraft for the U.S. Air Force, with an F-22 taking control of a YFQ-44A Fury in flight in a test disclosed in mid-October.

Ghost Shark originated in a co-development contract signed in May 2022 between Anduril Australia, the Royal Australian Navy and the Defence Science and Technology Group for three prototype vehicles over three years, with the first prototype delivered in 2024 and all three handed over on budget and ahead of schedule. The program of record worth A$1.7 billion followed in September 2025, covering what Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles described as dozens of vehicles to be delivered over five years. Anduril opened its 7,400 square metre Sydney factory on October 31, 2025, when the first production vehicle came off the line ahead of a planned delivery to the navy in January 2026, and the facility is also able to build the Dive-XL, the commercial version of the design.