After 14 years in development, the U.S. Navy has introduced its Snakehead Large Displacement Unmanned Undersea Vehicle (LDUUV) prototype at the Narragansett Bay Test Facility in Newport, Rhode Island.

The Snakehead LDUUV drone is designed to launch underwater from the U.S. Navy’s nuclear-powered submarines featuring Dry Deck Shelters — removable modules that can be attached to submarines, allowing divers easy exit and entrance while a boat is submerged.

Source: U.S. Navy

According to its developers, the Snakehead is capable of performing intelligence-gathering missions, deployed ahead of a submarine to scout and monitor specific locations.

Powered by Lithium-ion Fault Tolerant (LiFT) batteries, the Snakehead drone supports such underwater missions via guidance and control, navigation, situational awareness, propulsion, maneuvering and sensor technologies.

In addition to keeping submarines safe from threats, the drones could also be used to locate missing planes, for instance.