Cheap first-person-view drones now hunting larger prey in Ukraine

Elisabeth Gosselin-Malo

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MILAN – Low-cost first-person-view drones are proving increasingly capable of striking larger platforms — such as combat helicopters — in Ukraine, as their pace of development has accelerated to allow them to fly faster and further.

On Aug. 7, the Ukrainian military released footage showing one of its unknown models of FPV drones successfully hitting the tail rotor of a Russian Mi-28 Havoc attack helicopter over the battlefield.

The hit represented one of the first filmed strikes on a manned Russian helicopter, in flight, using a Ukrainian FPV platform. While these variations of drones have been used widely across the battlefield, experts say efforts to use them to bring down larger, expensive aircraft have been previously unsuccessful.

“There were numerous attempts of Ukrainian FPVs trying to chase Russian helicopters before, but all such attacks were near misses,” Sam Bendett, a research analyst at the U.S.-based Center for Naval Analyses, said. “It’s difficult to pilot an FPV drone towards a military helicopter flying at high speeds.”

Although it is not possible from the available recording to certify the overall impact of the hit on the aircraft, Bendett says that the fast-paced evolution of these small drones and the ways they can be used should be watched closely by militaries globally.

“The sky over the [Ukraine] battlefield is now teeming with fast-flying FPVs hunting much larger prey, and assuming one can be piloted to the helicopter’s vulnerable part — like its rear propeller — major damage can be done,” he said.

Helicopters have proven especially vulnerable throughout the war in Ukraine, due in part to the proliferation of ground-based air defenses that have rendered manned flight across the battlefield extremely difficult.