BlackSea Revives the LASH Concept for Floating ISO Containers
The 85-foot NightTrain floats its boxes aboard through an open centreline bay
The American autonomous-boat builder Blacksea Technologies has reworked the Cold War concept of the Lighter Aboard Ship vessel, reduced its scale and applied it to contested logistics. Its new autonomous-vessel design, NightTrain, keeps the core idea of a self-lightering vessel for shallow-water deliveries, but carries watertight, floating ISO containers in place of 40-tonne barges.
The LASH idea was developed in the 1960s as an alternative to containerised freight and breakbulk. A militarised variant, the Cape M-class Sea Bee barge carrier, served through the Cold War for shallow-water and beachhead logistics. The large barges used by LASH carriers could not compete commercially with ISO containers, and the specialised vessels were eventually repurposed or retired.
NightTrain marries the modularity and intermodal flexibility of the ISO container with the undeveloped-port capability of the LASH carrier, at far smaller scale. Here the container is both the cargo and the floating lighter. Instead of the heavy, mechanically complex stern hoist of a LASH carrier, NightTrain has an open bay down the centreline so the cargo can be floated aboard, in the manner of a semisubmersible heavy-lift ship.
The payload capacity of the 85-foot vessel is about 70 tonnes overall, with a speed of 11 knots and a range of about 2,700 nautical miles. It can take a handful of boxes stowed end to end, up to a combined length of 53 feet, the maximum single container size found in North America.
From a naval perspective the most significant attribute may be the low profile. Illustrations from the manufacturer show a hull riding low in the water with the bow intermittently awash, similar to a semisubmersible. The small radar cross-section reduces the odds of detection and intercept, which suits a vessel designed for autonomous resupply through contested waters. The stated mission is to keep sustainment moving when ports, airfields, predictable routes and assured communications are no longer guaranteed, and to create a distributed alternative to traditional logistics.
BlackSea is building a prototype in aluminium and has completed most of the hull. The company developed the Global Autonomous Reconnaissance Craft, the most widely used U.S. Navy autonomous boat, and delivers 32 of them every month. It was acquired last week by aerial drone maker Aevex for as much as $650 million.
