Ukraine has revealed a new interceptor built to take down Russia’s latest jet-powered drones, and it features a design that loosely resembles the Shaheds that Moscow uses extensively in the war.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted footage of the interceptor on Saturday, saying it was “successfully deployed” in an operation by the Security Service of Ukraine, or SBU.
Video shows a delta-wing drone being launched from a rail catapult and whizzing over open fields. The uncrewed vehicle appears to have an exhaust outlet on its chassis, indicating it uses a turbojet engine to reach higher speeds.
The delta-wing form and turbojet are a departure from the bullet-shaped quadcopters that have dominated Ukrainian interceptor designs — a sign of how Kyiv is looking to solutions further afield to deal with newer Russian drones.
Thermal footage apparently captured by its camera shows the interceptor approaching a winged drone with a heat signature on its tail, indicating that the target is also propelled by a turbojet.
The SBU identified the drone as a Geran-5, one of Russia’s most advanced attack drones that Ukrainian intelligence said can fly at speeds of up to 373 mph with a 200-pound explosive warhead.
On Sunday, it posted a clip of a separate takedown, saying it had successfully used the interceptor to destroy a second Geran-5.
Zelenskyy said the new Ukrainian interceptor is designed for defending against “jet-powered ‘Shaheds.'”
The Geran-5 isn’t modeled after the Shahed, the Iranian delta-wing drone, and is instead thought to be Russia’s version of the Karrar attack drone. But “Shahed” has come to be a colloquial blanket term for any Russian long-range loitering munition based on Iranian designs, since Moscow most commonly uses Shahed-type drones to attack Ukraine.
These drones have long been a primary threat to Ukraine, bombarding its cities and killing hundreds of civilians. Kyiv has emphasized its urgent need for an affordable, mass-producible way to counter these munitions, leading to the rise of interceptor drones.
These were initially small quadcopters tricked out to fly at speeds of up to 175 mph. But Russia’s growing use of drones with powerful jet engines to fly much faster, such as the Geran-5, has forced Kyiv to look for other solutions.
In August, Zelenskyy said authorities were working with four companies designing interceptor drones to counter jet-powered Gerans.
That month, Ukraine’s defense ministry unveiled the Alexa Spatium, a turbojet, winged interceptor drone.
The local interceptor and drone manufacturer Wild Hornets said on Saturday that its Sting S interceptor, deployed by the 1020th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment, had successfully destroyed a Geran-5.
