Armed Multirotor Drone Crashes Near Zaporizhzhia, Highlights Growing Risks To Large Urban Areas

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A (seemingly Russian) armed multirotor drone is reported to have recently crashed somewhere in/near the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia. While the frontlines have hardly shifted in the sector along what used to be the Kakhovka Reservoir, the frontlines are now some 25 km from the outskirts of the Ukrainian-controlled city, and the practical range-endurance of armed multirotor drones keeps increasing. This notably includes the use of fixed-wing uncrewed aircraft/drones, which can serve as both "motherships" and aerial repeaters/radio relays for armed multirotor drones of the radio frequency communication uplink/downlink variety (those of the fiber optic variety are not well suited for use with fixed-wing uncrewed aircraft).

While the Kherson metropolitan area has been subject to sustained Russian attacks involving the use of armed multirotor drones, other large Ukrainian cities located near the frontlines, namely Kharkhiv, Sumy, and, to a much lesser degree, Zaporizhia, have not yet been subjected to regular and large-scale attacks involving the use of armed multirotor drones in the manner of smaller towns located close to/along the frontlines. If and when a large city comes within the practical range-endurance of armed multirotor drones, we are likely to witness a fundamentally new approach to urban warfare that will likely make the use of armed multirotor drones in battlefields characterized by open terrain look banal. Recent developments in the Kherson metropolitan area may offer a preview of what is to come in the Russia-Ukraine War and beyond:

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