People might have wondered in the week before Christmas to see a mongoose and a hammerhead seemingly at play in the waters of the Annapolis Basin.

Mongoose is the name of a camouflage-painted high-speed patrol vessel that A.F. Theriault and Son of Meteghan built as a prototype in 2005.

Using advanced composites of carbon fibre, Kevlar and compressed foam, the eight-metre boat is capable of speeds of 50 miles an hour.

More importantly for a craft meant for military use, its hull is proof against small arms fire.

Not so the Hammerhead, an ‘unmanned surface vehicle' that Theriault and Son also manufactures. The vessel, painted flat black without a cockpit, is meant to be a target.

But built low to the water and skimming along at high speeds it will be a hard one to hit.

Henry Porter, a former Coast Guard officer working with the Meteghan boatbuilder on the Mongoose project, said the two Hammerhead vessels being tested in the Basin are bound for Germany where the navy will use them in target practice.

Meggitt Defence Systems Canada, a firm in Medicine Hat, Alta., designed the Hammerhead to aid the world’s navies prepare to fight small and fast attack craft, similar to those that killed 17 American sailors and caused major damage to the USS Cole in 2000.

The Alberta firm worked with Theriault and Son to develop the craft, and two Alberta firms designed computer systems and software.

The computers allow swarms of as many as 16 Hammerheads to mount a mock attack to test a ship’s defences and the system can then provide individualized scoring for an ‘after action review’.

An article earlier this year in the Canadian Defence Review noted the system provides the world’s first ‘after action review’ of a swarm attack, and the Hammerhead has attracted considerable foreign interest.