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Ukraine’s interceptor drones are countering Russia’s new jet-powered Geran-3 attack drones.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
Russia has deployed 138 Geran-3 drones, which are faster and more advanced than Geran-2 models.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
Ukrainian developers are rapidly adapting drone technology to meet evolving Russian drone threats.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Russia’s new high-speed attack drones<\/a> are increasingly appearing on the battlefield, but Ukrainians said they’ve already destroyed some with cheap interceptors.<\/p>\n Serhii Sternenko, the leader of a volunteer organization specializing in donating drones to Ukrainian units, said on Sunday that the Sting<\/a> \u2014 a locally built interceptor drone \u2014 successfully destroyed several jet-powered attack drones.<\/p>\n “A bit of a historic achievement,” wrote Sternenko in his Telegram channel. He published a photo that appears to show the back of a jet-powered Geran-3 in the sky, indicating that the footage was captured by an aircraft fast enough to catch the Russian drone.<\/p>\n The announcement is another sign of how Ukraine is finding ways to fight the growing threat of jet-powered strikes, amid concerns that Russia’s new drones are too fast to be reliably destroyed through inexpensive means.<\/p>\n On Sunday, Ukraine’s General Staff said in a description of a monthly briefing<\/a> for officials that Russia had already deployed 138 of the new uncrewed aerial systems.<\/p>\n This turbojet drone is the Geran-3<\/a>, Russia’s domestic version of the Iranian Shahed-238 long-range loitering munition. With an estimated top speed of 230 mph, the Geran-3 flies much more swiftly than its propeller-driven predecessor, which the Kremlin has been using to hammer Ukraine in large waves over the past year.<\/p>\n The Geran-2, modeled after the Shahed-136, flies at around 115 mph and is now the foundation of Moscow’s bombardment strategy.<\/p>\n Russia regularly accumulates these mass-produced drones to send in large waves over the border, pairing them with hundreds of decoys to overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses. Kyiv officials have said Geran-2s can cost as little as $20,000 each.<\/p>\n In response, Ukrainians are developing interceptor drones<\/a>, or small first-person-view drones modified to fly at high speeds, as a low-cost way of countering the Geran-2. Each one typically costs between $2,000 and $6,000, and they’re now considered a crucial part of Ukraine’s air defense system, working in tandem with machine gun crews and a range of other interceptors.<\/p>\n The Sting, the interceptor mentioned by Sternenko, is one such drone that is frequently deployed. It was developed by the Ukrainian company Wild Hornets<\/a> to fly at roughly 215 mph with four rotors.<\/p>\nA challenge for new interceptors<\/h2>\n