- Ukraine’s naval drones fired missiles at — and hit — three Russian helicopters earlier this week.
- The first-of-its-kind combat engagement occurred off the coast of Crimea.
- It’s the latest achievement for Kyiv’s naval drones, which have been modified to carry missiles.
Ukrainian naval drones armed with heat-seeking missiles shot down two Russian helicopters and damaged a third above the Black Sea earlier this week, Kyiv said on Thursday.
The unusual combat engagement marked the first known instance of a naval drone firing on and striking an aircraft. The Ukrainian military previously reconfigured its uncrewed boats for sea-based air defense.
The milestone combat operation unfolded on Tuesday off the western coast of the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula. Ukrainian naval drones equipped with missile launchers fired at three helicopters, destroying two of them and damaging a third.
The crews of the destroyed helicopters, identified as Mi-8s, were killed, Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, also known as the HUR, said on Thursday. The damaged helicopter managed to land.
The HUR credited the operation to a special forces unit called “Group 13,” which fields the Magura V5, one of several naval drones in service with the Ukrainian military.
Earlier this week, the HUR said that a Magura V5 drone took down a single Mi-8 with R-73 air-to-air missiles. The R-73 is a decades-old, short-range missile that uses infrared homing technology. Two days later, Ukraine revealed that a second helicopter was destroyed and a third damaged.
The HUR published a radio intercept purportedly containing audio from one of the Mi-8 pilots after the Russian helicopter was hit. “There was a water launch,” the pilot says in the recording, describing how a missile exploded near the aircraft. Business Insider could not independently verify any of the details of the operation.
This week’s incident is not the first time that Ukrainian naval drones have engaged Russian helicopters in a firefight; last month, Kyiv shared footage showing a similar engagement on the other side of Crimea involving a drone outfitted with a machine gun. However, the downing of an aircraft marks a new chapter in naval drone warfare.
Photo by Pavlo Bahmut/Ukrinform/Future Publishing via Getty Images
Kyiv’s domestically produced naval drones have played a key role in its Black Sea operations. In addition to the Magura V5, Ukraine also fields other sea drones, like the Sea Baby platform in service with the Security Service of Ukraine.
Ukraine lacks a traditional navy, so it has relied on these naval drones to wage a successful campaign against Russian interests across the Black Sea, using them in attacks against Moscow’s warships, aircraft, and infrastructure, like bridges and oil platforms.
Through this asymmetrical campaign, Ukraine’s drones have effectively driven Moscow’s Black Sea Fleet away from its long-held headquarters in Crimea and forced it to relocate across the region to the port of Novorossiysk in southwestern Russia.
Ukraine has innovated with its naval drones through various modifications that make them more threatening, like adding missile launchers to give them air-defense capabilities. Some of the drones have also been outfitted with rocket launchers, guns, and even other drones.
