Editing Naval mine (section)

==== Minehunting ====
[[File:Minenjagddrohne Pinguin.jpg|thumb|''Pinguin B3'' minehunting drone, such are operated from {{sclass|Frankenthal|minehunter|1}}s of the [[German Navy]]]]
{{main|Minehunting}}

As naval mines have become more sophisticated, and able to discriminate between targets, so they have become more difficult to deal with by conventional sweeping. This has given rise to the practice of minehunting. Minehunting is very different from sweeping, although some [[minehunter]]s, known as [[Mine countermeasures vessel|mine countermeasures vessels (MCMVs)]] can do both tasks.  Minehunters use specialized high-frequency sonars and high fidelity sidescaning sonar to locate mines, which are then inspected and destroyed either by divers or [[Remotely operated underwater vehicle|ROV]]s (remote controlled unmanned mini-submarines).<ref name="minewar" />{{rp|18}} It is slow, but also the most reliable way to remove mines, as it circumvents most anti-minesweeping countermeasures. Minehunting started during the Second World War, but it was only after the war that it became truly effective.

Sea mammals (mainly the [[bottlenose dolphin]]) have been trained to hunt and mark mines, most famously by the [[U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program]]. Mine-clearance dolphins were deployed in the [[Persian Gulf]] during the [[Iraq War]] in 2003. The US Navy claims that these dolphins were effective in helping to clear more than 100 antiship mines and underwater [[booby trap]]s from [[Umm Qasr Port]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.smithsonianmag.com/issues/2003/september/phenomena.htm |archive-url=https://archive.today/20070901162827/http://www.smithsonianmag.com/issues/2003/september/phenomena.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=2007-09-01 |title=Uncle Sam's Dolphins |work=[[Smithsonian (magazine)|Smithsonian Magazine]] |date=September 2003 |access-date=2011-12-31 }}</ref>

French naval officer [[Jacques Yves Cousteau]]'s Undersea Research Group was once involved in minehunting operations: They removed or detonated a variety of German mines, but one particularly defusion-resistant batch—equipped with acutely sensitive pressure, magnetic, and acoustic sensors and wired together so that one explosion would trigger the rest—was simply left undisturbed for years until corrosion would (hopefully) disable the mines.<ref>Cousteau, Jacques Yves. ''The Silent World'', p. 58. New York: 1953, Harper & Row.</ref>
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