‘It’s time to shoot it down,’ Russian says of Odessa’s Yak-52 killer drone

The Russians are really fed up with the Ukrainian crew of this Yakovlev Yak-52 training aircraft who engaged and shot down Russian surveillance drones, World War I style.

In three months, two airmen aboard a Yak-52 – a pilot in the front and a gunner in the rear – have shot down at least 12 Russian drones, according to the kill signs painted by the crew on the side of the plane dating from the 1970s.

“Isn’t it time to shoot him down?” wrote one Russian blogger.

The problem for the Russians is that a Yak-52 is difficult to shoot down for the same reason that it makes an effective platform for a crewman armed with a shotgun to fire at nearby drones. The Yakovlev is rugged and stealthy.

A propeller-driven Yak-52 does not have a great influence on the radar screens of Russian long-range air defense batteries. And even if you damage a Yak-52, for example by hitting it with a drone, the crew could probably land the plane.

Earlier this month, another Russian blogger complained that the Yak-52 crew was “shooting at our drones like it was a shooting range” over the southern Ukrainian city of Odessa.

This was not a new problem. Apparently looking for an effective way to take out $100,000 Russian drones without firing a $4 million Patriot missile or other expensive air defense munition, the Ukrainians began flying this Yak-52 last April, maneuvering it to within shotgun range of intruding drones and blowing them up.

It worked so well that earlier this month, Ukraine’s intelligence leadership began training gunners to track Russian drones from locally-made Aeroprakt A-22 sport planes. The Yakovlev crew’s successful hunts inspired an entirely new anti-drone tactic.

The Russians are losing patience as losses mount. “The Yak-52 flew over Odessa and shot down our reconnaissance drones with great efficiency for a week, causing laughter in some circles,” the blogger wrote. “It’s been a long time since we and the drone operators have been funny.”

But it is unclear what exactly the Russian military can do against the Yak-52. Its patrol zone is at least 80 kilometers from the nearest Russian position. But the nearest Russian air defense batteries are likely much further away, as Ukrainian drone and missile raids continue to reduce their numbers and push them away from the front line.

Regardless, a Yak-52 could be difficult to detect. A 1976 study found that a Cessna 172, a propeller-driven aircraft similar in size and shape to a Yak-52, has an equivalent radar area of ​​less than a square meter at some angles. That’s a quarter of the equivalent radar area of ​​a conventional fighter jet.

The Russian operators of the drones that the Yak-52 crew is tracking could try to hit the Ukrainian plane. This would not be unprecedented. On numerous occasions during Russia’s 28-month war with Ukraine, Russian and Ukrainian crews have shot down enemy drones by hitting them with their own drones.

But it is one thing for two drones weighing a few kilos each to collide in mid-air: one can destroy the other. But if a 9-kilo ZALA surveillance drone collides with a 1.5-ton Yak-52, the damage may not be catastrophic.