Ukraine is using $100,000 octocopter drones to destroy Russian tanks and artillery worth millions, even in the dead of night, operator says

Ukraine has been using homemade $100,000 octocopter drones to destroy Russian tanks on the battlefield, an operator said.
The R18 octocopters destroyed 10 Russian tanks in recent months, a drone pilot told CBS News. 
In the last month, a Ukrainian military unit “destroyed $40 million worth of Russian hardware,” a commander said.

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Ukraine has a lot of cheap, throwaway drones flying on the front lines, but some others come with higher price tags. One homemade octocopter runs for $100,000, but this weapon appears to be proving its worth, taking out far more expensive Russian tanks and artillery pieces, even in the dead of night, an operator said.

The Ukrainian-made R18 octocopters equipped with thermal imaging cameras and capable of carrying ordnance that can be dropped on enemy assets below have been wreaking havoc on the battlefield amid Russian President Vladimir Putin’s grinding war with the Eastern European country. 

One drone operator with Ukraine’s 24th Separate Mechanized Brigade, who goes by the callsign Sunset, told CBS News in a report published this week that his unit has already used R18 octocopters to annihilate 10 Russian tanks in the past few months. The value of a single Soviet-era T-72 tank is estimated to be over a million dollars while Russia’s more advanced tanks, like the T-80s and T-90s, are worth even more.

The 24th Separate Mechanized Brigade has been utilizing the octocopter drones since May, Sunset said, according to the report, which said they’re “deadliest after dark.”

He didn’t mention Ukrainian drone losses, but a Ukrainian official estimated in August that Ukraine was losing 40 to 45 drones a day, including some of its higher-end systems. Some other estimates have been much higher, with researchers previously putting losses at 10,000 drones a month. It is unclear which of these figures is accurate or if these losses include intentionally attritable systems, such as one-way attack drones.

The commander of the Ukrainian military unit, who goes by the callsign Hasan, told CBS News that in the last month alone his soldiers had “destroyed $40 million worth of Russian hardware” using drones. 

He added that his unit was slated to be beefed up from about 60 to 100 troops and that it would need to scale up its drone fleet.

In recent months, the Ukrainian military has also been using much cheaper, low-budget drones rigged with explosive devices, such as anti-tank rocket-propelled grenades, against Russian forces. 

Those drones, which cost around $400, have become extremely prominent and have emerged as the leading anti-tank weapon for the Ukrainian military amid Russia’s 20-month-long invasion of Ukraine. Russian forces are also using exploding drones in the war. 

Ukraine’s Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov has said that Ukraine is dedicated to building up a cutting-edge “army of drones,” and that project has seen the introduction of thousands of unmanned platforms into combat.

Fedorov said in a tweet on Friday that nearly 2,000 high-tech drones equipped with an AI tool to automatically “detect” and “track” targets are being sent to the front lines.

“Quality data means more brilliant results by UAVs strike units. Stay tuned,” Fedorov said.

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