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Sources:
Drones strike Yelabuga, Tatarstan: hitting the Elaz-Nefteproduct refinery and the Shahed drone factory. Yelabuga sits 1,200 km from Ukraine's border.
https://twitter.com/maria_avdv/status/1775051040435454324
Ukraine is now supposedly capable of using light airplanes as kamikaze drones coming that far into the Russian territory. This is most probably an [Aeroprakt A-22 Foxbat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroprakt_A-22_Foxbat), a Ukrainian-produced light aircraft, equipped with an additional fuel tank and a remote control system.
https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1775050929013702865
More footage and location
https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/1775046840104198245
I remember playing it at a kid.
Maybe 10 or so, where i did not know anything about the cold war or how i should make sense of this game as a quasi b-movie-history-fanfiction or something.
But i remember that the robots seemed off to me. They were not referenced in the life-action-cutscenes and the rest of the technology is more like experimental high-tech stuff.
Best was the suicide bomber from C&C Generals, which was changed into a [RC suicide bomb car](https://cnc.fandom.com/wiki/Terrorist_(Generals_1\)#German_censorship).
I was confused for a second because suicide car bomb *is* a unit in C&C Generals (suicide bomber entering an abandoned car can drive it). Then I read the wiki page and now I have the wonderful image of a dynamite-laden RC car driving a bigger car.
Meaning you often need several of them, which is imperfect. I am sure Ukraine is working on this too, including ways to get the explosive below the water line. Personally, I would love to see the Sea Baby just launch a torpedo when it's close enough.
EDIT: and it doesn't need to be a smart torpedo, just something that can cruise 1-2 metres below the surface for 50 metres until a WWII-style magnetic fuse says it should detonate.
I'm sure they'll continue to improve them, but ultimately the benefit of these things _is_ their price and simplicity, and the trade-off for achieving that benefit is reduced performance.
Sea Baby have a much longer range then a torpedo, much better stealth then a missile, lower acoustic signature then a torpedo, and have a bigger payload then many torpedos and anti-ship missiles. It is hard to compare the performance of vastly different weapons systems. The only way to compare their performance is to count the casualties it causes, and so far the Sea Baby have caused several important ship casualties and even a bridge casualty that we know of. I would say it is performing very well in this conflict.
Especially vs a torpedo or missile cost standpoint too. 500k-1mil for missile attacks to sink a 100 mil ship, vs a 200k seababy×2 to sink a 100 mil ship.
That's about one Javelin. Or 1/20 of a Tomahawk.
Not speaking about the price of Russian super-cyber-hyper missiles that get abused to bomb a playground.
I would call that a bargain.
Not as fast as Tomahawk, worse sensors, easier to shoot down, lower range, probably smaller warhead, needs a runway to take off.
But... around 1/20 price 😐
Launch 20 of them at the same time, enemy will shoot down some, some will reach their mark. The ones which were shot down, they were cheaper then cheapest missiles used to destroy them. Bargain.
They are not allowed to use US/EU delivered weapons on Russian territory. But they can launch these drones on Russian refineries as fast as they can make them.
If it’s completely gutted of seats, manual controls and other necessary components or comforts for human pilots/passengers, that could reduce the empty weight even more for extra explosives, fuel and such.
If Ukraine is building these from scratch it also saves on build time and there might be certain safety steps and checks they can skip for a pilotless, one-way aircraft.
Yup, and windows are also unnecessary. All of these things reduce cost as well.
If one would design it from scratch, one could also have much less margins in the mechanical design, since it will only fly once and never land.
Landing gear is also not necessary, it could take off like Me163 Komet.
Doesn't really need a human sized cockpit, does it? They can design a smaller one, better aerodynamics, less material.
And yeah, since it's single use, and safety of pilot is not a concern, there is a whole bunch of small savings that can be done.
I mean, at some point you're just designing it to either look like a predator uav without landing gear if you want max range, or a tomahawk if you want it going 500+ knots subsonic. Subsonic aerodynamics is a pretty well understood subject, the main reason they're using these converted aircraft is that they have available aircraft and or tooling for production of this aircraft design. Of course they want it to have 5000 mile range and fly at 700mph 30ft over the ground or whatever, but they're working with what they got.
I am actually quite surprised they leave the landing gear on the airplane. They could have a simple mechanism to detach it right after take off and saved some weight and drag. Similarly they might remove windows and doors. If you want to go extreme you do not need double magnetos or carb heat either, or for that matter air filter. And of course most of the avionics can be replaced with much simpler sensors that only feed the autopilot.
I always wondered if they couldn't just make a remote control Cessna to fly deep into Russia to attack airfields. We already know ~~Soviet~~ Russian air defenses have trouble with small planes.
Well that will have a negative impact on the light aircraft use in Russia. Everyone of them spoted will now be assumed to be a Ukrainian drone strike.
The electronics are the same for control with the sensor package so I expect only the servos would need to be significantly modified from other purpose built shorter range drones.
Now Russia will have to move thier manufacturing further back if they do not expect it to be targeted.
**"Well that will have a negative impact on the light aircraft use in Russia. Everyone of them spoted will now be assumed to be a Ukrainian drone strike."**
This. Could drive the russians crazy. What's more, any aircraft the size of a Cessna 172 is far bigger and heavier than many kamikaze drones: can carry much more explosives.
Yeah the aeropakt has an empty weight of 260kg and max take of 450 kg on 1100km range. Probably with these modifications it could carry a 200kg bomb compared to a Shahed with 50kg. So these guys could pack a punch over a huge distance for relatively low costs.
Modifying it as a drone you could tear out seats, floorboards, heaters, radios; anything that even suggests "passenger comfort" becomes "more payload".
Mimicking some dude going for a simple flight from one city to another.
And, good grief, imagine the havoc Ukraine could create if these modifications were being done from within Russia.
A scary drone that never needed to cross the border to tip off what was coming.
Ouch, thats a thought.
Infiltrate a small crew 3-4 man team with a 500 pound bomb and a tech. Find hanger with unused light plane, modify it over a few days. No loud noises needed just strapping servos in and testing them.
95% of hangers never get checked more than once a month. Launch at 4am when airport is closed, vacate, let drone operator fly from nearest Hilton to target. Now every plane in Russia will have to be checked hourly. Huge manpower suck.
Mine is 325 kg empty and 600kg mtow.
Obviously that's equipped to carry people so it might be lighter empty as a drone. I think it could easily be loaded beyond 600 kg as no landing is required on a one way trip...
It's just bizarre to see the video of the strike. This is literally a small airplane, moving as slow as molasses, and they didn't manage to shoot it down in 1200km from the border until it hit one of the most important factories (for the war effort) in the whole country?
This is more than just embarrassing for Russia.
Not directly related but they have used so many S-300s as makeshift ballistic missiles in Ukraine, rumors say Russian air defenses are somewhat depleted...
They have also just lost quite a few systems and manufacturing new ones ofls very difficult for them. They have been moving systems west throughout Russia and thinning defenses to keep systems on the front.
Funny enough it is not the first time. A german teen landed a cesna near the red square in the 87. That was hugely embarrassing
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathias_Rust&ved=2ahUKEwjoxKipz6OFAxWZgv0HHbU4BY4QFnoECBkQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2zWLjQ39G9vPIwp1W6iXWf
Mathias Rust managed to fly from West Germany in 1987 and land on the Red Square in Moscow in a Cessna 172 Skyhawk. Russians has always been shit when it comes to this.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised by this. Big aircraft tend to go high up and use recognised flight paths, so are easy to track and contact by ATC. Small ones like this typically stay low and more or less do their own thing. If this happened somewhere in Europe or north America it would probably have got quite a good distance without being flagged up either, so long as it had a flight path that didn't put it anywhere it's not supposed to be.
The only 2 points of concern are crossing the Russian border and the approach to the factory. The former could be circumvented by starting off in Russia. The latter could be a result of Russia thinking the factory was safe.
Did you see the videos from within the factory that was droned in Belgorod during the Russian Free Legion offensive?
I mean the holes 30 meters up there in the roof were nice, but the effect was quite limited.
Now if the drone was full of fuel that would drip through the hole and set the insides on fire instead...
I don't know if it's still the case, but in WW2 strategic bombing I believe that blowing open factory roofs was the main goal. As soon as the weather gets in, all those expensive machines rust up quickly.
Never thought I'd see the day we'd have to worry about people flying planes into buildings... hmm... wait actually I think I do remember that happening once before..
It is somewhat wild to me that a country at war has that little control over their airspace. I get that Russia has a huge border, but still. If I'm reading this right this is essentially a civilian plane retrofitted with some RC gear and high explosives. Something like this ought to show up like a giant red triangle with an exclamation point in it on anyone's radar. If it is really as simple as loading up small airplanes, doing some retrofitting and then flying them over Russia to blow up targets of interest then whew what a sorry state they must be in.
How the hell does this work?
It takes off, and flies over the most contested border in the world, a border where proper fighter aircraft fear to fly near because they can be shot down - and are regularly shot down.
It’s a non-stealth light aircraft that flies at about 200 mph. Once over the border, it bumbles along for 5 hours, presumably flying low, but not at tree top height because it is only a remote controlled light plane.
What is air defence doing? This is another Mathias Rust moment.
Good explosion though!
Russia has been losing a lot of radar and has a huge border. Every time a radar gets destroyed, they have to choose where they'll let the coverage drop to fill up the holes.
So now NATO decides to have huge exercises on the western border and Russia can't let that area go unchecked. Which limits options.
Then Crimea gets bombarded and the fleet gets attacked constantly. So they definitely need radar there.
Which limits options even more.
And slowly more gaps pop up in an already poorly defended area.
And all of the sudden small prop planes can fly 1200 km into Russia without even being noticed, let alone prompt a jet scramble.
That... is actually an excellent strategy if you're not going to undertake direct confrontation.
So, proposition. All of those confiscated/impounded oligarch private jets and light aircraft... can we send those back to Russia in the same manner?
It's also why Finland joining NATO is so significant. Suddenly the Russia-NATO border has like quadrupled in length. So much more ground to cover in terms of border guards etc.
Russia even sent soldiers to the finnish border to prop up the internal narrative that they need to "protect against NATO aggression", so that's tying down troops that could've been sent to Ukraine instead
Finland just *existing* in NATO is helping Ukraine!
NATO tomorrow: We are pleased to announce a joint training exercise which will be conducted across Finland, Estonia, and Latvia. President Biden of the United States will also be visiting Georgia, and President Macron will be visiting Armenia, so NATO will be present there, too.
Russia: ***sweating***
Remember those A 50s that no longer exist? Im pretty sure those were most of the russians eyes and ears. There are probably loads of holes in their air defence.
Looks like the local police saw it coming and blocked off the area. It just means they don't have resources to intercept all of these. A few heavy missiles, sure shoot them down, 1 commuter plane that might have a bomb, might be a distraction, or might have a spy... is it worth NOT shooting that missile for?
I think it speaks to their ability to spare said missile at the moment. In other words, you can not reach into the pockets of a man who is standing naked.
A FOXBAT flat out may get 100kts, about 115 mph. But will use alot of fuel. Best cruise for economy about 80kts...
I'm thinking it might have gone too slow for Russian radars to pick it up as a threat?
I'm not the guy you replied to, but I think they meant that they wouldn't be seen as a threat because it's too slow to be a missile, and too slow to be a conventional attack aircraft
But after a couple more of these, the russians will have to expand their threat range to include slow moving small airplanes, which is probably gonna put a huge amount of extra stress on the shitshow they call air defense
> They'd have so much plausible deniability.
I think that is the reason for the daylight attacks, make sure Russia can't say it's America attacking with space lasers or something.
If Russian government wanted to claim that, they could sell it easily to Russian population, and the rest of the world would still decide to believe what they want to believe.
I mean isis publicly claimed responsibility for a terror attack and Russia said that Ukraine did it, they don't need to do anything to spin a narrative.
Hmmm, maybe it has a transponder that makes it look like an innocent private plane?
Or maybe since it just looks like a civilian plane it got left alone
> Or maybe since it just looks like a civilian plane it got left alone
Russia does not have a great track record when it comes to leaving civilian planes alone.
don’t worry guys… The SMO is going excellent, we will win any day now /s.
Welcome to the war you cretins, how does it feel being on the receiving side?
Obvious answer is he's an amateur chemist and had his resupply of sodium onboard and unfortunately landed directly in the swimming pool. Bad luck all round. Couldn't have happened to a nicer country
Foxbat... in your face, MiG-25 ! Wonder if the name is intentionally derisive.
Russia "We have a Mach 3 superweapon: a fighter called Foxbat. Fear, Ukraine !"
Ukraine "Hold my beer. We have a superweapon Foxbat, too: a Cessna-172 like drone " LMAO.
The world should donate more lightweight single prop old but working airplanes to Ukraine for this.
Will make the Russians supper paranoid. They will start shooting each other out of the air.
"Aeroprakt" I read that as Aeroprank lmao.
"Ayo welcome to United24 YT channel and today we gonna prank our dear russian bros at the shahed manufacturing plant ! Let's see if they like to party hard coz we gonna lit it on fire!!
Subscribe for more explosions !"
It's really hard not to, sometimes. So much at stake, such brilliant defence by Ukraine. Absolutely outstanding country and people. Globally inspirational and a real smack in the kisser to the world's autocratic monsters.
>Absolutely outstanding country and people
Couldn't agree more. I know and talk with Ukrainians for more than 20 years for professional reasons and I can only say good things about them.
According to this, 15 to 17 year old kids from the school do work in the factory and are forced to work there, and one of the drones hit the dormitory the students live in.
There's a photo of the [alleged] damage from the drone strike on the dormitory also: https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/1000-km-away-from-ukraine-details-of-attacks-1712052376.html
"Interestingly, back in the summer of 2023, the Russian opposition community Protokol wrote that students from Alabuga were involved in assembling Shahed drones for the front line. Teenagers aged 15 to 17 are forced to work round the clock, sometimes without breaks for sleep and food, with refusal to work resulting in expulsion."
Thanks, just saw some more info on these students
Russian sources report that the 12 victims of the drone strike in Yelabuga are students. They were "forcibly" compelled to assemble Shahed drones - Dozhd Russian TV channel
▪️ Students are threatened with expulsion for refusing to work;
▪️ They are paid about 30-40 thousand rubles a month;
▪️ Among the students are citizens of South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Rwanda and Nigeria;
▪️ They have to work 24 hours a day, sometimes without breaks;
▪️ Disclosure of information about production is punishable by a fine of up to 2 million rubles;
▪️ In early 2023, two college students committed suicide.
In the video, Alabuga's CEO flashed the enterprise in one of the news stories a year ago.
InformNapalm, an international intelligence community, reminded Timur Shagivaleev, general director of the Alabuga Special Economic Zone, who claimed that a peaceful dormitory was attacked, how a year ago he demonstrated to local journalists the production of attack drones at this location.
"Today, Shagivaleev is paltering with truth, telling us that a 'student's dormitory was attacked.' Students who have been assembling weapons to kill Ukrainians for a year. So it is important not to be confused about cause-and-effect relationships," InformNapalm analysts noted.
That's a little wasteful, but there are certainly many planes at the end of their service life like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov\_An-2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-2) that could serve their country on a last mission, carrying over two tons of high explosives or some termobaric charge...
Get fucked!
And it'll keep working because there is never enough AA capability around to protect all the targets. And there is a new dillema for the russians. Protect the factories, the front is less protected. Protect the front and the factories are vulnerable. They're fucked either way.
To all those saying "but it is the size of a Cessna" and "how could they not shoot it down", take the time to read up on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathias_Rust
To me, it’s weird that they’re clearly prepared for the impact. So don’t they have any anti-aircraft systems in russia. 1200km in russian airspace with that small plane it clearly wasnt undetected so why they didnt blow it up.
Oh, right, I did not catch the end of the video for some reason. Could be just a coincidence (start/end of a shift), but it does seem odd. Those Sx00 AA systems do have a lot of range, but Russia is BIG, they are not cheap and they are concentrated near the frontline.
I suppose it is possible that it was detected by civilian radars and they could warn the target, but getting AA to respond is not trivial.
Edit: Also, I suppose Ukrainians could have just called 15 minutes in advance in order to avoid bad optics of civilian casualties, sounds bizarre, but...why not? You average plant manager is not scrambling AA in a day, much less 15 minutes, but he can pull fire alarm.
The Cessna, russian border guards ancient enemy.
https://www.sandboxx.us/news/how-a-teenager-with-a-cessnas-insane-trip-helped-topple-the-soviet-union/
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This one sparks joy. And a fire.
We don't need no water, let the motherfucker burn.
Burn motherfucker, burn.
Wish they have 100000 drones like that.
This one sparks fear 😧 nice to see these worried,like the Ukraine people have to,everyday.Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦🇬🇧🇺🇦🇬🇧
you can't keep it tho
Sources: Drones strike Yelabuga, Tatarstan: hitting the Elaz-Nefteproduct refinery and the Shahed drone factory. Yelabuga sits 1,200 km from Ukraine's border. https://twitter.com/maria_avdv/status/1775051040435454324 Ukraine is now supposedly capable of using light airplanes as kamikaze drones coming that far into the Russian territory. This is most probably an [Aeroprakt A-22 Foxbat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroprakt_A-22_Foxbat), a Ukrainian-produced light aircraft, equipped with an additional fuel tank and a remote control system. https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1775050929013702865 More footage and location https://twitter.com/markito0171/status/1775046840104198245
Even the damn suicide bombers have now been replaced by computers. No job is safe
The german versions of Command and Conquer had it right all along.
I didn't play the german versions, could you elaborate?
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I remember playing it at a kid. Maybe 10 or so, where i did not know anything about the cold war or how i should make sense of this game as a quasi b-movie-history-fanfiction or something. But i remember that the robots seemed off to me. They were not referenced in the life-action-cutscenes and the rest of the technology is more like experimental high-tech stuff.
Best was the suicide bomber from C&C Generals, which was changed into a [RC suicide bomb car](https://cnc.fandom.com/wiki/Terrorist_(Generals_1\)#German_censorship).
I was confused for a second because suicide car bomb *is* a unit in C&C Generals (suicide bomber entering an abandoned car can drive it). Then I read the wiki page and now I have the wonderful image of a dynamite-laden RC car driving a bigger car.
Ergo, every life is valuable. On Ukraine's part, it's been a war of precision. Drone operators win badges and stripes, and medals, too.
To be fair, it had always been a one-time gig.
It had a great payout though. One quick, simple job and you'd be set for life
Health benefits were shit, though.
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But come back home without success and you always get a second chance!
And without a human pilot there is another 70 kg of payload that can be explosives. Win-win.
And the human pilot works remotely and can come back for another suicide mission the day after. And the day after that.
This is serious because being this type of pilot was a job for life.
> Even the damn suicide bombers have now been replaced by computers. No job is safe Goddamn, why did I laugh at this?
Because it is pitch black comedy.
Dang future and these new fangled devices.
Ahmed: “took our joopobs habibi”
Empty weight: 260 kg (573 lb) Max takeoff weight: 450 kg (992 lb) That does make for an excellent bomb carrier
And it costs $80k, which is pretty affordable for a long range missile.
A Sea baby is more than twice the price at 200k
Sea baby’s cost compared to the ships it takes out is insane
Sea Baby v the cost of a modern torpedo is insane.
But their performance is also dramatically worse compared to a modern torpedo or anti-ship missile.
Meaning you often need several of them, which is imperfect. I am sure Ukraine is working on this too, including ways to get the explosive below the water line. Personally, I would love to see the Sea Baby just launch a torpedo when it's close enough. EDIT: and it doesn't need to be a smart torpedo, just something that can cruise 1-2 metres below the surface for 50 metres until a WWII-style magnetic fuse says it should detonate.
I'm sure they'll continue to improve them, but ultimately the benefit of these things _is_ their price and simplicity, and the trade-off for achieving that benefit is reduced performance.
Sea Baby have a much longer range then a torpedo, much better stealth then a missile, lower acoustic signature then a torpedo, and have a bigger payload then many torpedos and anti-ship missiles. It is hard to compare the performance of vastly different weapons systems. The only way to compare their performance is to count the casualties it causes, and so far the Sea Baby have caused several important ship casualties and even a bridge casualty that we know of. I would say it is performing very well in this conflict.
Especially vs a torpedo or missile cost standpoint too. 500k-1mil for missile attacks to sink a 100 mil ship, vs a 200k seababy×2 to sink a 100 mil ship.
That's about one Javelin. Or 1/20 of a Tomahawk. Not speaking about the price of Russian super-cyber-hyper missiles that get abused to bomb a playground. I would call that a bargain.
Not as fast as Tomahawk, worse sensors, easier to shoot down, lower range, probably smaller warhead, needs a runway to take off. But... around 1/20 price 😐 Launch 20 of them at the same time, enemy will shoot down some, some will reach their mark. The ones which were shot down, they were cheaper then cheapest missiles used to destroy them. Bargain.
... and being independent of the US Congress whim - priceless.
They are not allowed to use US/EU delivered weapons on Russian territory. But they can launch these drones on Russian refineries as fast as they can make them.
Plus the enemy had to expend 19 defence missiles to kill your drones, and *still* missed one.
Free if you steal them from a Russian airport, load them with explosives and remote control equipment.
If you steal anything from a Russian airport it'll be hard enough to make it fly, let alone be remote controllable.
If it’s completely gutted of seats, manual controls and other necessary components or comforts for human pilots/passengers, that could reduce the empty weight even more for extra explosives, fuel and such. If Ukraine is building these from scratch it also saves on build time and there might be certain safety steps and checks they can skip for a pilotless, one-way aircraft.
Yup, and windows are also unnecessary. All of these things reduce cost as well. If one would design it from scratch, one could also have much less margins in the mechanical design, since it will only fly once and never land.
Oh, it will land alright. When it does, the Orcs will sure have a blast.
Landing gear is also not necessary, it could take off like Me163 Komet. Doesn't really need a human sized cockpit, does it? They can design a smaller one, better aerodynamics, less material. And yeah, since it's single use, and safety of pilot is not a concern, there is a whole bunch of small savings that can be done.
I mean, at some point you're just designing it to either look like a predator uav without landing gear if you want max range, or a tomahawk if you want it going 500+ knots subsonic. Subsonic aerodynamics is a pretty well understood subject, the main reason they're using these converted aircraft is that they have available aircraft and or tooling for production of this aircraft design. Of course they want it to have 5000 mile range and fly at 700mph 30ft over the ground or whatever, but they're working with what they got.
So basically, one would design..a drone 😇
You will need some kind of windows for the aerodynamics, otherwise you will lose lots of range and also have a negative impact on flight stability.
Of course. But covering the window openings with sheet aluminum would save weight compared to the plexiglass.
Some SBU agent is frantically writing stuff down right now.
I am actually quite surprised they leave the landing gear on the airplane. They could have a simple mechanism to detach it right after take off and saved some weight and drag. Similarly they might remove windows and doors. If you want to go extreme you do not need double magnetos or carb heat either, or for that matter air filter. And of course most of the avionics can be replaced with much simpler sensors that only feed the autopilot.
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I always wondered if they couldn't just make a remote control Cessna to fly deep into Russia to attack airfields. We already know ~~Soviet~~ Russian air defenses have trouble with small planes.
Now lets see a TU-204 be remotely piloted into the Kremlin
Well that will have a negative impact on the light aircraft use in Russia. Everyone of them spoted will now be assumed to be a Ukrainian drone strike. The electronics are the same for control with the sensor package so I expect only the servos would need to be significantly modified from other purpose built shorter range drones. Now Russia will have to move thier manufacturing further back if they do not expect it to be targeted.
**"Well that will have a negative impact on the light aircraft use in Russia. Everyone of them spoted will now be assumed to be a Ukrainian drone strike."** This. Could drive the russians crazy. What's more, any aircraft the size of a Cessna 172 is far bigger and heavier than many kamikaze drones: can carry much more explosives.
Yeah the aeropakt has an empty weight of 260kg and max take of 450 kg on 1100km range. Probably with these modifications it could carry a 200kg bomb compared to a Shahed with 50kg. So these guys could pack a punch over a huge distance for relatively low costs.
Modifying it as a drone you could tear out seats, floorboards, heaters, radios; anything that even suggests "passenger comfort" becomes "more payload".
> heaters You might need that for electronics.
That aircraft won't be flying at max altitude. I bet it's flying low and slow.
Mimicking some dude going for a simple flight from one city to another. And, good grief, imagine the havoc Ukraine could create if these modifications were being done from within Russia. A scary drone that never needed to cross the border to tip off what was coming.
Ouch, thats a thought. Infiltrate a small crew 3-4 man team with a 500 pound bomb and a tech. Find hanger with unused light plane, modify it over a few days. No loud noises needed just strapping servos in and testing them. 95% of hangers never get checked more than once a month. Launch at 4am when airport is closed, vacate, let drone operator fly from nearest Hilton to target. Now every plane in Russia will have to be checked hourly. Huge manpower suck.
And, it being Russia, I'd imagine there's even ways to round up enough explosives from within the country too. But not too many times though.
Most electronics need cooling, not heating.
Ambients are much lower at altitude and condensation is an issue.
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Mine is 325 kg empty and 600kg mtow. Obviously that's equipped to carry people so it might be lighter empty as a drone. I think it could easily be loaded beyond 600 kg as no landing is required on a one way trip...
Yep this, a lot of stuff can be removed if you assume that you have no people on board.
You have your own kamikaze light aircraft? Cool!
It's just bizarre to see the video of the strike. This is literally a small airplane, moving as slow as molasses, and they didn't manage to shoot it down in 1200km from the border until it hit one of the most important factories (for the war effort) in the whole country? This is more than just embarrassing for Russia.
The Russian Defence largely exists on Paper.
Not directly related but they have used so many S-300s as makeshift ballistic missiles in Ukraine, rumors say Russian air defenses are somewhat depleted...
They have also just lost quite a few systems and manufacturing new ones ofls very difficult for them. They have been moving systems west throughout Russia and thinning defenses to keep systems on the front.
Funny enough it is not the first time. A german teen landed a cesna near the red square in the 87. That was hugely embarrassing https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathias_Rust&ved=2ahUKEwjoxKipz6OFAxWZgv0HHbU4BY4QFnoECBkQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2zWLjQ39G9vPIwp1W6iXWf
Mathias Rust managed to fly from West Germany in 1987 and land on the Red Square in Moscow in a Cessna 172 Skyhawk. Russians has always been shit when it comes to this.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised by this. Big aircraft tend to go high up and use recognised flight paths, so are easy to track and contact by ATC. Small ones like this typically stay low and more or less do their own thing. If this happened somewhere in Europe or north America it would probably have got quite a good distance without being flagged up either, so long as it had a flight path that didn't put it anywhere it's not supposed to be. The only 2 points of concern are crossing the Russian border and the approach to the factory. The former could be circumvented by starting off in Russia. The latter could be a result of Russia thinking the factory was safe.
Just a little of explosives is fine, as long as the plane is full to the brim with fuel...
Weeel, I'd prefer a bit more C4 over a lot more fuel.
Did you see the videos from within the factory that was droned in Belgorod during the Russian Free Legion offensive? I mean the holes 30 meters up there in the roof were nice, but the effect was quite limited. Now if the drone was full of fuel that would drip through the hole and set the insides on fire instead...
I don't know if it's still the case, but in WW2 strategic bombing I believe that blowing open factory roofs was the main goal. As soon as the weather gets in, all those expensive machines rust up quickly.
Por que no los dos?
Why no the two?
I'm thinking we scale this up, maybe a small cargo plane next time lol?
So, basically Boeing Jets as is?
There’s a lot of 2-engine Gulfstreams out there, not to mention Learjets…
Never thought I'd see the day we'd have to worry about people flying planes into buildings... hmm... wait actually I think I do remember that happening once before..
next time use a 737.
Prefect use case for the MAX.
It might not make it to the target.
Together with the CEO and the board
Only safe use for it...
Yo could you imagine a max being remotely used like this…
Better use an airbus. After all, you want it to explode on impact. Not on takeoff.
plausible deniability would be easier with a MAX
As a dutch guy .... where can I donate for this? If we donate enough, can it be called the "The Flying Revengeful Dutchman"?
But there is no documentation and screws are loose.
It is somewhat wild to me that a country at war has that little control over their airspace. I get that Russia has a huge border, but still. If I'm reading this right this is essentially a civilian plane retrofitted with some RC gear and high explosives. Something like this ought to show up like a giant red triangle with an exclamation point in it on anyone's radar. If it is really as simple as loading up small airplanes, doing some retrofitting and then flying them over Russia to blow up targets of interest then whew what a sorry state they must be in.
Nice air defence, Vlad
It's busy bombing Belgorod
And shooting their own fighters out the sky.
The fact they had police cordons and media crew ready says they can see these coming and do nothing about them.
Or this was not the first strike.
How the hell does this work? It takes off, and flies over the most contested border in the world, a border where proper fighter aircraft fear to fly near because they can be shot down - and are regularly shot down. It’s a non-stealth light aircraft that flies at about 200 mph. Once over the border, it bumbles along for 5 hours, presumably flying low, but not at tree top height because it is only a remote controlled light plane. What is air defence doing? This is another Mathias Rust moment. Good explosion though!
Russia has been losing a lot of radar and has a huge border. Every time a radar gets destroyed, they have to choose where they'll let the coverage drop to fill up the holes. So now NATO decides to have huge exercises on the western border and Russia can't let that area go unchecked. Which limits options. Then Crimea gets bombarded and the fleet gets attacked constantly. So they definitely need radar there. Which limits options even more. And slowly more gaps pop up in an already poorly defended area. And all of the sudden small prop planes can fly 1200 km into Russia without even being noticed, let alone prompt a jet scramble.
Excellent point about the NATO exercises.
That... is actually an excellent strategy if you're not going to undertake direct confrontation. So, proposition. All of those confiscated/impounded oligarch private jets and light aircraft... can we send those back to Russia in the same manner?
get some hotshot oligarch's conficated big boat and attack Sevastopol. They would never dare to shoot at it
How about putins yacht lol?
It's also why Finland joining NATO is so significant. Suddenly the Russia-NATO border has like quadrupled in length. So much more ground to cover in terms of border guards etc.
Russia even sent soldiers to the finnish border to prop up the internal narrative that they need to "protect against NATO aggression", so that's tying down troops that could've been sent to Ukraine instead Finland just *existing* in NATO is helping Ukraine!
It is. NATO should also flood them with flights near their airspace. Like the ones the ruzzians are doing for years already.
And when they do scramble their jets their buddies end up shooting them down. Yeesh
NATO tomorrow: We are pleased to announce a joint training exercise which will be conducted across Finland, Estonia, and Latvia. President Biden of the United States will also be visiting Georgia, and President Macron will be visiting Armenia, so NATO will be present there, too. Russia: ***sweating***
Remember those A 50s that no longer exist? Im pretty sure those were most of the russians eyes and ears. There are probably loads of holes in their air defence.
Air Traffic Control, identify yourself, are you russian? Da! Just taking my babushka for a joyflight
"Henlo, this is Matthias Rust schpeaking, pleaze give me landing permischion for rote Place pleaze!"
Wouldnt be too hard to relay the radio to a Russian speaker in Ukraine
Looks like the local police saw it coming and blocked off the area. It just means they don't have resources to intercept all of these. A few heavy missiles, sure shoot them down, 1 commuter plane that might have a bomb, might be a distraction, or might have a spy... is it worth NOT shooting that missile for?
I think it speaks to their ability to spare said missile at the moment. In other words, you can not reach into the pockets of a man who is standing naked.
A FOXBAT flat out may get 100kts, about 115 mph. But will use alot of fuel. Best cruise for economy about 80kts... I'm thinking it might have gone too slow for Russian radars to pick it up as a threat?
You definitly pick up on radar at 80 kts, and even slower
I'm not the guy you replied to, but I think they meant that they wouldn't be seen as a threat because it's too slow to be a missile, and too slow to be a conventional attack aircraft But after a couple more of these, the russians will have to expand their threat range to include slow moving small airplanes, which is probably gonna put a huge amount of extra stress on the shitshow they call air defense
I like to imagine what B-2's, F-22's, and F-35's could do to Russia right now on a moonless night. They'd have so much plausible deniability.
> They'd have so much plausible deniability. I think that is the reason for the daylight attacks, make sure Russia can't say it's America attacking with space lasers or something.
If Russian government wanted to claim that, they could sell it easily to Russian population, and the rest of the world would still decide to believe what they want to believe.
I mean isis publicly claimed responsibility for a terror attack and Russia said that Ukraine did it, they don't need to do anything to spin a narrative.
stall speed is according to wikipedia 52km/h (32mph). possibly S300 and pantsir ignore (means cannot detect ) such slow aircraft.
"Target is too slow. Suggest chase on foot!"
Hmmm, maybe it has a transponder that makes it look like an innocent private plane? Or maybe since it just looks like a civilian plane it got left alone
> Or maybe since it just looks like a civilian plane it got left alone Russia does not have a great track record when it comes to leaving civilian planes alone.
The ukrainians really goes all out with drones... first, Tupolev 123s and now: light aircraft.
[удалено]
Hell yes !!
When this is over and Ukraine joins NATO they're going to be the ones hosting the masterclass on drone warfare.
Fuck yeah lads. They just continue to amaze us all with their ingenuity.
It's beautiful. A light aircraft suicide drone kills a suicide drone factory. I love these guys.
don’t worry guys… The SMO is going excellent, we will win any day now /s. Welcome to the war you cretins, how does it feel being on the receiving side?
To UA: [More](https://media1.tenor.com/m/0engAwwUVF4AAAAC/more-kylo-ren.gif). [MOre](https://media1.tenor.com/m/Udn7tqw-Jc0AAAAd/yelling-leon-the-professional.gif). [MORe](https://media1.tenor.com/m/rG1S4EXrXJwAAAAC/xena-xena-warrior-princess.gif). [MORE](https://media1.tenor.com/m/zEI-3VUZRRsAAAAC/gif.gif).
Nice work Ukraine! More fuck them Z facist putin lovers
Excellent. Less shaded = less ukrainians dead. Also this is ironic : a suicide plan attacks a suicide bomber plant lol
As a rule of thumb now wait for some ruzzian plane to be shot down by their own AA defense.
It looks like regular airplane
Student pilot in a Cessna 172 misjudged his first solo landing
Was also carrying a suitcase that a friend had packed for him.
Obvious answer is he's an amateur chemist and had his resupply of sodium onboard and unfortunately landed directly in the swimming pool. Bad luck all round. Couldn't have happened to a nicer country
Thats not like SIM
Sims 3?
Its a Ukrainian built Aeroprakt A-22 Foxbat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroprakt_A-22_Foxbat
Foxbat... in your face, MiG-25 ! Wonder if the name is intentionally derisive. Russia "We have a Mach 3 superweapon: a fighter called Foxbat. Fear, Ukraine !" Ukraine "Hold my beer. We have a superweapon Foxbat, too: a Cessna-172 like drone " LMAO.
The world should donate more lightweight single prop old but working airplanes to Ukraine for this. Will make the Russians supper paranoid. They will start shooting each other out of the air.
"Aeroprakt" I read that as Aeroprank lmao. "Ayo welcome to United24 YT channel and today we gonna prank our dear russian bros at the shahed manufacturing plant ! Let's see if they like to party hard coz we gonna lit it on fire!! Subscribe for more explosions !"
Eat shit Russian Cunts!! Heroyam Slava!
You know that I could easily spend all day watching videos like that.
It's really hard not to, sometimes. So much at stake, such brilliant defence by Ukraine. Absolutely outstanding country and people. Globally inspirational and a real smack in the kisser to the world's autocratic monsters.
>Absolutely outstanding country and people Couldn't agree more. I know and talk with Ukrainians for more than 20 years for professional reasons and I can only say good things about them.
Niiiiiiiice.
All these kids screaming. I hope they learn why the factory their parents work at is being targeted.
Likely the kids work there https://twitter.com/victoriaslog/status/1689773847489187840
According to this, 15 to 17 year old kids from the school do work in the factory and are forced to work there, and one of the drones hit the dormitory the students live in. There's a photo of the [alleged] damage from the drone strike on the dormitory also: https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/1000-km-away-from-ukraine-details-of-attacks-1712052376.html "Interestingly, back in the summer of 2023, the Russian opposition community Protokol wrote that students from Alabuga were involved in assembling Shahed drones for the front line. Teenagers aged 15 to 17 are forced to work round the clock, sometimes without breaks for sleep and food, with refusal to work resulting in expulsion."
Thanks, just saw some more info on these students Russian sources report that the 12 victims of the drone strike in Yelabuga are students. They were "forcibly" compelled to assemble Shahed drones - Dozhd Russian TV channel ▪️ Students are threatened with expulsion for refusing to work; ▪️ They are paid about 30-40 thousand rubles a month; ▪️ Among the students are citizens of South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Rwanda and Nigeria; ▪️ They have to work 24 hours a day, sometimes without breaks; ▪️ Disclosure of information about production is punishable by a fine of up to 2 million rubles; ▪️ In early 2023, two college students committed suicide. In the video, Alabuga's CEO flashed the enterprise in one of the news stories a year ago. InformNapalm, an international intelligence community, reminded Timur Shagivaleev, general director of the Alabuga Special Economic Zone, who claimed that a peaceful dormitory was attacked, how a year ago he demonstrated to local journalists the production of attack drones at this location. "Today, Shagivaleev is paltering with truth, telling us that a 'student's dormitory was attacked.' Students who have been assembling weapons to kill Ukrainians for a year. So it is important not to be confused about cause-and-effect relationships," InformNapalm analysts noted.
> In early 2023, two college students committed suicide. : ( That fucking country kills everything it touches.
I saw posts earlier in the war that Russia was forcing high school students to work in this factory so the ones screaming may be the workers.
Looking forward to a rebuilt remote controlled AN-225 packed with 190 tons of explosives being crashed into the Kremlin.
That's a little wasteful, but there are certainly many planes at the end of their service life like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov\_An-2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-2) that could serve their country on a last mission, carrying over two tons of high explosives or some termobaric charge...
Remember when a guy managed to land his light aircraft in Red Square? Obviously I'm not suggesting...
Ahahaha that massive size is no longer favourable to Russia to much area to defend. Pretty funny
Ohhh yesss
Next up: Putler's dacha with him inside.
I guess they'll have to move production to Iran then.
more of this please; and more often, on a regular basis. thank you.
It does look like a FOXBAT. I own and fly one. Made in Ukraine. Great little aircraft.
Get fucked! And it'll keep working because there is never enough AA capability around to protect all the targets. And there is a new dillema for the russians. Protect the factories, the front is less protected. Protect the front and the factories are vulnerable. They're fucked either way.
Can we get more drones for Ukraine? I want these videos to keep coming :)
ruzzian screaming in panic, my favorite wakeup music. Thank you.
Ukraine continue to impress me each and everyday
To all those saying "but it is the size of a Cessna" and "how could they not shoot it down", take the time to read up on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathias_Rust
Absolute cinema
Glorious💥 The Ukrainian drones are increasingly far-reaching. I think it's the farthest they've ever flown, isn't it?
Is that a kamikaze or the fuq
The thing is - if you can remote control small plane, you can remote control big plane as well.
I just thought of a new use for the 737-MAX.
If it is going to crash anyway might as well make it a useful crash with no people on board.
Myh.. MCAS would crash it before target.. :P
finally a useful task the 737 feateres are made for.
To me, it’s weird that they’re clearly prepared for the impact. So don’t they have any anti-aircraft systems in russia. 1200km in russian airspace with that small plane it clearly wasnt undetected so why they didnt blow it up.
Apparently 2 drones hit, this is the second one which is why they seemed prepared
Prepared?
Police presence and people gathering outside? Seems prepared to me.
Oh, right, I did not catch the end of the video for some reason. Could be just a coincidence (start/end of a shift), but it does seem odd. Those Sx00 AA systems do have a lot of range, but Russia is BIG, they are not cheap and they are concentrated near the frontline. I suppose it is possible that it was detected by civilian radars and they could warn the target, but getting AA to respond is not trivial. Edit: Also, I suppose Ukrainians could have just called 15 minutes in advance in order to avoid bad optics of civilian casualties, sounds bizarre, but...why not? You average plant manager is not scrambling AA in a day, much less 15 minutes, but he can pull fire alarm.
Holy shit, they're converting planes to kamikadze drones now?
I'm just about to log onto work after a 4-day weekend...my mood was low, and then this :D
Yo dawg, I heard you like drones...
This is me when playing Vice City back in the day.
Are you telling me Russia has not a single interception capability for 1200 km? How are they supposed to reliably detect nuclear weapons??
The Cessna, russian border guards ancient enemy. https://www.sandboxx.us/news/how-a-teenager-with-a-cessnas-insane-trip-helped-topple-the-soviet-union/