Strikes on the Russian Federation – how long-range attack drones are being made in western Ukraine

In western Ukraine, unmanned aerial vehicles with a range of up to 800 kilometers are being produced to attack oil refineries (refineries), airfields and logistics on the territory of the Russian Federation. Journalists from The Wall Street Journal who visited the plant spoke about how Ukrainian drones are manufactured.

Before the outbreak of a full-scale war, the owner of the plant ran a business producing plastic containers in the north of the Kharkov region. After moving to the western region, he worked in the field of railway logistics, but in the summer of 2023, Ukrainian intelligence agencies approached him, asking if he could reproduce a prototype of a long-range drone. For this purpose, the businessman hired several specialists who worked in the aviation industry during the Soviet era.

In two months, the team created two copies of the drone, which were tested. Currently, 75 people work on the production line of the plant. After 11 hours of curing in the oven, the parts are assembled into a small aircraft with a wingspan of 2 meters. The engine and explosives are installed at another plant.

The next challenge for the facility is scaling, as the factory can only produce one or two frames of each type of drone per day. To do this, the owner plans to expand the premises and hire another 50 people to work in two shifts. In addition, he is developing his own UAV model with a flight range of more than 1000 kilometers.

According to journalists, domestically produced drones allow Kyiv to attack targets deep behind Russian lines under conditions of restrictions imposed on the use of weapons supplied by allies. Drones are cheaper and more accessible than cruise missiles. They deprive Moscow of income from energy exports, reduce fuel reserves for the Russian Armed Forces, and also force the Russian occupiers to withdraw air defense systems away from the front line.

The article states that Ukrainian officials say they intend to produce thousands of long-range drones this year. Amid the growing demand for UAVs, many startup drone manufacturers have emerged in Ukraine. It is unknown how many long-range drones Ukrainian enterprises currently produce. One manufacturer says he plans to increase production to 500 units per month by the middle of this year.

OSINT analyst HI Sutton counted 19 different models of drones used by Ukrainians to attack the Russian Federation.

“What Ukraine needs to do is optimize production and select those drones that can be produced on a mass scale,” said Samuel Bendett, an expert on unmanned aerial vehicles from the US Center for Naval Analytics.

Let us recall that, according to Forbes on April 24, Ukraine also uses inexpensive balloons for attacks on the Russian Federation, equipped with modern electronics and dropping mortar bombs from a great height, which can increase the strategic strike potential of Kyiv.

In addition, on April 26, the Russians showed a photo of an unmanned kamikaze aircraft, with the help of which, allegedly, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are carrying out strikes on the territory of the Russian Federation. According to the OSINT analyst, the device is a modified Sky Ranger “Nynja” light aircraft.