Ukraine's 'High Speed' Pilotless Bombers Are Lobbing 550-Pound Bombs

After six months, the unmanned, reusable sport planes are striking more widely

Russian troops in occupied southern Ukraine have come under attack by what was, to them, something new—a Ukrainian drone that drops a bomb during “high-speed” and “precise” strikes, according to one popular Telegram channel.

In fact, it seems the drone may be a known quantity: an Aeroprakt A-22, a modified sport plane that can range as far as 1,200 miles as fast as 137 miles per hour to drop a 550-pound bomb. One Russian soldier recorded, through his thermal scope, one of the drones dropping its bomb in southern Ukraine’s Kherson Oblast recently. (See video above.)

The Ukrainian military’s Unmanned Systems Forces branch first deployed pilotless A-22s more than a year ago. The initial A-22 drones were one-way models that carried explosives in their cabins and slammed into their targets. The USF has aimed them at factories and headquarters deep inside Russia.

A propeller-driven A-22 costs nearly $100,000 before the addition of autonomous navigation, and Kyiv-based Aeroprakt can build the planes only so fast. So there’s obvious value in making the A-22s and similar drones reusable.