Shahed Drones

Shahed Drones Latest News

The United States recently raised serious concerns about the capabilities of Iran’s Shahed attack drones.

About Shahed Drones

• Shahed (meaning witness in Farsi) drones are low-cost, one-way-attack unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) developed by Iran. 
• Often referred to as “kamikaze” or “suicide” drones, they function essentially as guided missiles that fly towards a pre-designated target and explode on impact. 
• Most widely used variants: Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 
• Russia refers to the Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 as “Geran-1” and “Geran-2,” respectively.
• Each Shahed is reported to have an estimated cost between $20,000 and $50,000, making them cheaper than most other long-range, OWA UAVs. 
• Ballistic and cruise missiles, by contrast, can cost millions of dollars each.
• This low cost, along with a low-altitude flight profile and self-sacrificial nature, has seen Shaheds labelled “the poor man’s cruise missile”.
• Produced in large numbers, swarms of Shahed drones can overwhelm air defences by saturating them from multiple directions at once. 

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Shahed Drones Features

• The Shahed-131 has a range of 700–900 km, while the Shahed-136 has the longer range, i.e., between 2,000 and 2,500 kilometres.
• They are between 2.5 and three metres long and weigh around 200 kg at launch, most of which is the fuel and payload.
• They are launched using a disposable rocket booster fitted to their underside. Shortly after launch, the booster is jettisoned, and a piston-driven engine takes over to provide propulsion.
• They can be launched from both static rail mounts as well as vehicles.
• For navigation, it uses a combination of civilian GPS/GLONASS and an inertial navigation system (INS) often pre-programmed with coordinates before launch.
• They can be equipped with various warheads, including high-explosive fragmentation, thermobaric, and shrapnel-filled munitions, maximising damage to both personnel and equipment.

Source: TOI