Russia is throwing more of its new jet-powered Shaheds at Ukraine, but interceptor drones are rising to match them

• Ukrainian interceptor drones thwart new Russian Geran-3 attack drones.

• Russia has deployed 138 Geran-3 drones, faster and more advanced than the Geran-2 models.

• Ukrainian developers are rapidly adapting drone technology to respond to evolving Russian threats.

Russia’s new high-speed attack drones are increasingly appearing on the battlefield, but the Ukrainians claim to have already destroyed some of them with cheap interceptors.

Serhii Sternenko, the head of a volunteer organization specializing in donating drones to Ukrainian units, said on Sunday that the Sting – a locally built interceptor drone – had managed to destroy several jet attack drones.

“This is a historic feat,” Sternenko wrote on his Telegram channel. He posted a photo that appears to show the back of a Geran-3 jet in the sky, indicating that the images were captured by a plane fast enough to catch the Russian drone.

The announcement is another sign of how Ukraine is finding ways to combat the growing threat of jet strikes, amid concerns that Russia’s new drones are too fast to be reliably destroyed by inexpensive means.

On Sunday, Ukraine’s General Staff said in a description of a monthly briefing to officials that Russia has already deployed 138 of these new unmanned aerial systems.

This turbojet drone is the Geran-3, the Russian version of the Iranian long-range Shahed-238 munition. With an estimated top speed of 230 mph, the Geran-3 flies much faster than its propeller-driven predecessor, which the Kremlin has used to hit Ukraine in big waves over the past year.

The Geran-2, modeled on the Shahed-136, flies at around 185 mph and now forms the basis of Moscow’s bombing strategy.

Russia regularly accumulates these mass-produced drones to send large waves across the border, pairing them with hundreds of decoys to overwhelm Ukraine’s air defenses. kyiv officials have said the Geran-2s could cost as little as $20,000 each.

A challenge for the new interceptors

In response, the Ukrainians are developing interceptor drones, or small first-person view drones modified to fly at high speeds, as an inexpensive way to counter the Geran-2. Each typically costs between $2,000 and $6,000, and they are now considered a crucial part of Ukraine’s air defense system, working in tandem with machine gun crews and a range of other interceptors.

One such frequently deployed drone is the Sting, the interceptor mentioned by Sternenko. It was developed by the Ukrainian company Wild Hornets to fly at around 215 mph with four rotors.

Sporadic appearances of the Geran-3 over the past year, however, have raised concerns that these interceptor drones are too slow to catch waves of jet-powered Shaheds.

If that were the case, the war would resurface the main problem of defending Ukraine against such large-scale air attacks: cost. The country is already resource-strapped and cannot afford to use expensive traditional missiles to shoot down cheap Russian drones.

The latest General Staff report indicates that Ukraine recently destroyed most of the 138 Geran-3s used by Russia, but it is unclear by what means.

Senior Ukrainian officials told Business Insider’s Jake Epstein last month that Russia was experimenting with the Geran-3 to test and probe Ukraine’s defenses.

But they also said Moscow had deployed the new drones in limited numbers. This would indicate that Russia has not yet achieved mass production on the scale it achieved with the Geran-2.

The Geran-3 is significantly more advanced than the Geran-2, of which Russia produces thousands each month, with newer features such as a satellite navigation system that improves resistance to electronic warfare.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian drone developers previously told Business Insider that they are preparing for the possibility of the Geran-3 taking over the skies.

The deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Pavlo Palisa, said in September that kyiv had already developed drones “capable of fighting the Shaheds with jet engines.” However, he did not disclose details about these new interceptors.

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