Ukraine has set a new record for downing Shahed drones by a single soldier: in one night, a serviceman from the 1020th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment destroyed 24 kamikaze drones
I bet that one of those would also be bad news for, say, an unwary attack helicopter; the attack helicopter can outrun it if it knows that it’s coming, but a $2,500 man-portable surface-to-air drone with a 20 km range has got to make attack helicopter crews a lot more twitchy; that’s got more than double the range of a Stinger and can maneuver around terrain.
Hmm.
My own guess has been that interceptor drones are probably going to need to be part of any successful counter-drone system, but for a different reason than Ukraine has been using these: because any fixed ground-based air defenses can only cover a small area. The attacker can choose their point of attack, and can concentrate their attacking drones there, whereas the defender has to spread out their defenses.
But the STING things are pretty short range when it comes to that problem.
Given that Ukraine’s got a solution for Shaheds, I wonder how viable it would be to operate a “mother ship” for these? That is, have a reusable fixed-wing aircraft — probably unmanned, maybe jet powered to make it faster — that can carry a load of STING drones. Act as a data relay for them, too.
Once a mass of incoming Shaheds are detected, it takes off, flies to a point in front of them, and then drops STING drones; it could even keep flying along with a mass of Shaheds and releasing more STING drones. That gives the STING operators more time to intercept and lets Ukraine concentrate their inventory of STING drones where the attack occurs.
One of the easiest way to deal with stuff like Shahed is to fly to them and shoot them down using a gun. Drones are no longer super cheap. They need to survive electronic warfare and that hardening costs a lot. A WW2 style prop plane with a 50cal or similar can just shoot down a Shahed no problem. There are plenty of trainer aircraft, which fit the bill.
Drones are no longer super cheap. They need to survive electronic warfare and that hardening costs a lot.
I don’t think that Shaheds need to be able to have a datalink home to operate. I remember reading about one that shot down or was crashed being found by Ukraine that did have some kind of radio, cell or Starlink or something, but I believe that that was the exception, that normally they just fly a preprogrammed path to a preprogrammed destination.
You might be able to disrupt the satellite navigation system that they’re using, make them rely on inertial navigation. But it doesn’t have the kind of dependency that the FPV drones do.
Their burn rate — they don’t get consumed unless they hit a Shahed or crash or something — is going to be comparable to Russia’s Shahed burn rate, so if they can saturate the country, then things become comparable.
The problem is that getting to that saturation point would require sticking them all over. And if Russia comes up with some adaptation to counted, you have a huge inventory that either has to be updated or might be obsoleted.
I suspect — I haven’t been reading about them — that they have them in target cities right now, which helps — however Russia intends to get to a target, they still have to fly to the target, end of the day. However they still gotta spread them out that way among potential targets, and in addition will have less time to do intercepts. If a couple hundred Shaheds strike at once, you’ve got a coordination problem for the STING operators, so that they aren’t all trying to chase the same Shahed. If they can be intercepting them midway, that gives them more time to bring the Shaheds down.
Ah, yeah, that’s interesting.
I bet that one of those would also be bad news for, say, an unwary attack helicopter; the attack helicopter can outrun it if it knows that it’s coming, but a $2,500 man-portable surface-to-air drone with a 20 km range has got to make attack helicopter crews a lot more twitchy; that’s got more than double the range of a Stinger and can maneuver around terrain.
Hmm.
My own guess has been that interceptor drones are probably going to need to be part of any successful counter-drone system, but for a different reason than Ukraine has been using these: because any fixed ground-based air defenses can only cover a small area. The attacker can choose their point of attack, and can concentrate their attacking drones there, whereas the defender has to spread out their defenses.
But the STING things are pretty short range when it comes to that problem.
Given that Ukraine’s got a solution for Shaheds, I wonder how viable it would be to operate a “mother ship” for these? That is, have a reusable fixed-wing aircraft — probably unmanned, maybe jet powered to make it faster — that can carry a load of STING drones. Act as a data relay for them, too.
Once a mass of incoming Shaheds are detected, it takes off, flies to a point in front of them, and then drops STING drones; it could even keep flying along with a mass of Shaheds and releasing more STING drones. That gives the STING operators more time to intercept and lets Ukraine concentrate their inventory of STING drones where the attack occurs.
One of the easiest way to deal with stuff like Shahed is to fly to them and shoot them down using a gun. Drones are no longer super cheap. They need to survive electronic warfare and that hardening costs a lot. A WW2 style prop plane with a 50cal or similar can just shoot down a Shahed no problem. There are plenty of trainer aircraft, which fit the bill.
I don’t think that Shaheds need to be able to have a datalink home to operate. I remember reading about one that shot down or was crashed being found by Ukraine that did have some kind of radio, cell or Starlink or something, but I believe that that was the exception, that normally they just fly a preprogrammed path to a preprogrammed destination.
You might be able to disrupt the satellite navigation system that they’re using, make them rely on inertial navigation. But it doesn’t have the kind of dependency that the FPV drones do.
Shahed is like 40 times the drone’s price though, if I have my numbers correct.
There’s a flip side to that. drone costs whatever, missile costs 40 times that, but if the missile hits its target you lose 400 times that or more
Their ad video says they work up to 25km. Is that false? Or is that considered not a lot?
Compared to something like traditional aircraft interceptors. Compared to, say, a SPAAG or many other static defenses, it’s long-range.
Also just spread out over the country, hooked up to the internet, ready to go.
Their burn rate — they don’t get consumed unless they hit a Shahed or crash or something — is going to be comparable to Russia’s Shahed burn rate, so if they can saturate the country, then things become comparable.
The problem is that getting to that saturation point would require sticking them all over. And if Russia comes up with some adaptation to counted, you have a huge inventory that either has to be updated or might be obsoleted.
I suspect — I haven’t been reading about them — that they have them in target cities right now, which helps — however Russia intends to get to a target, they still have to fly to the target, end of the day. However they still gotta spread them out that way among potential targets, and in addition will have less time to do intercepts. If a couple hundred Shaheds strike at once, you’ve got a coordination problem for the STING operators, so that they aren’t all trying to chase the same Shahed. If they can be intercepting them midway, that gives them more time to bring the Shaheds down.
Yes of course, I was thinking of future smart systems, and it’s probably a long way to that.
Well, Ukraine has shown insane speed and competence in development so who knows?