“On the protection of the sky”: border guards showed how they shoot down “Shahedy” – News

The border guards showed how they shoot down “Shahedy” in the South of Ukraine

Olena Bartienieva/Getty Images

For the second year now, Ukraine has suffered from Russian attacks by Iranian Shahed drones. To counter this threat more effectively, the defense forces created mobile fire groups.

The State Border Service told and showed how “Shakhed” are beaten down in the South of the country.

Today, mobile fire teams operate throughout the country. Their main task is the destruction of kamikaze drones. A large part of the personnel of such groups consists of border guards.

“At first, we hear about his (Shaheda” – ed.) passage from the advanced posts – by sound, on “Ether”. Then we see how the previous groups work, and we move from this. We are mobile thanks to the pickup truck. The machine gunner remains on the body , the rest move and hunt,” – machine gunner Bohdan describes the process of shooting down drones.

According to him, “Shaheds” are shot down with bullets with a caliber of 12 mm or more. Others are ineffective in this case. The main task is to damage the fuel system, the engine, the operating system – its “brains”. Otherwise, although the drone will be “holey”, it will fly to the target.

The border guard at the pseudo “Zamok” says that the biggest difficulty is to “catch” the drone. They do it with the help of a spotlight. It can illuminate up to a kilometer.

“If the weather is good, there is little difference between the sound from Shahed and the real approach. When the weather is windy, he can fly far, but it will seem that he is already behind. We need to find him quickly.” – shares “Castle”.

The commander of the DPSU unit Oleg explains that the mushroom that can be seen after the explosion is the detonation of the explosive part of “Shakhed”. The drone itself at this moment flies into small pieces.

“Once, the drone flew by very quickly – 10 seconds. They were already firing from the last cartridges, turned around – and there behind it was a fire mushroom with a radius of 50 meters”, – recalls the military man.

If there are parts of Shahed that can be studied, they are handed over to the competent authorities. The rest are collected to confirm the downing – those with a flight number, series.

According to machine gunner Konstantin, the biggest motivation in this job is to know that his family and other families are safe.

“It motivates. If you put it in, someone’s family will be able to sleep peacefully – without worries, without running to the basement. Because we are on the protection of the sky.” – he notes.

We will remind, the military Ian with the call sign “Kenobi” told how the International Legion is organized.