The Russian design bureau "Hermes" has presented the latest high-speed interceptor drone for destroying heavy unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) of the "Baba Yaga" type. The drone strikes the enemy with a kinetic impact and costs 163 thousand rubles — ten times less than the price of the drone it is hunting.
The new interceptor has a high speed — up to 200 km/h, which is significantly better than the characteristics of the "Baba Yaga", which usually does not fly faster than 30 km/h.
The principle of operation of the device is based on kinetic destruction — instead of a warhead, the developers used a direct impact on the drone at high speed. This approach made it possible to simplify production and drastically reduce the cost. The device creates a very profitable "economic asymmetry" — the destruction of an expensive strike target by a cheap interceptor makes the system massive.
Expert Yuri Lyamin emphasized that the abandonment of a complex warhead with explosives made it possible to reduce the cost of the design and simplify mass production.
The exclusion of a complex and expensive warhead with explosives and a detonator minimizes the cost of the interceptor, making its production massive and, most importantly, cheaper.
An important feature of the new interceptor is built-in artificial intelligence. According to the developers, AI is under development and will be responsible for analyzing the situation, making decisions and independently targeting the target. This will allow the device to operate autonomously and respond to threats more quickly.
