Description: During U.S. Navy testing at Channel Islands Harbor Marina on June 23, 2025, an unmanned vessel under tow reportedly received an inadvertent command and accelerated, capsizing the support boat and throwing its captain into the water. Emergency responders reportedly recovered the captain, who declined medical attention. The incident was reportedly attributed to software failures and human error, including communication breakdowns between onboard systems and external autonomy software.
Editor Notes: Timeline notes: The incident reportedly occurred 06/23/2025. The incident ID was created 06/29/2026.
Entities
View all entitiesAlleged: Unmanned surface vessel manufacturers , Defense technology companies , BlackSea Technologies and Autonomous maritime systems developers developed an AI system deployed by United States Navy , United States Armed Forces , Naval forces , Military organizations and Military autonomous systems operators, which harmed Watercraft , Vessel operators , Support boats and Maritime workers.
Alleged implicated AI systems: Unmanned surface vessels , Onboard vessel control systems , Military autonomous systems , BlackSea Technologies autonomous vessel , Autonomous maritime systems and Autonomous command-and-control software
Incident Stats
Incident ID
1561
Report Count
1
Incident Date
2025-06-23
Editors
Daniel Atherton
Incident Reports
Reports Timeline
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Variants
A "variant" is an AI incident similar to a known case—it has the same causes, harms, and AI system. Instead of listing it separately, we group it under the first reported incident. Unlike other incidents, variants do not need to have been reported outside the AIID. Learn more from the research paper.
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