Looks cutting edge to me.
Posted on 06/22/2024 9:33:29 AM PDT by marcusmaximus
Dramatic video shows Kyiv's propeller-driven Yak-52 hunting down a Russian drone.
UKRAINE are using WW2-style planes to hunt down Russian drones on the battlefield in a blow to Vladimir Putin's increasingly desperate war effort.
Air Marshal Greg Bagwell, a retired RAF commander, told The Sun Ukraine has taken inspiration from Britain's famous Spitfires and are making headway in the skies against Vlad's meatgrinder troops.
In a scene reminiscent of WW2, dramatic video showed Kyiv's propeller-driven Yak-52 plane in an intense dogfight with a Russian drone in the sky above southern Ukraine in April.
The 1970s two-seater training aircraft chased Vlad's spy drone while a co-pilot in the backseat fired a volley of shots from a machine gun at the invading UAV.
Within minutes, Ukraine's Spitfire-style plane - dubbed the 'Drone Hunter' - can be seen circling Russia's Orlan UAV after it took damage from a direct hit over Odessa.
Ukraine's military have been consistently adapting and improving their aircraft and weaponry since Vlad launched his barbaric full-scale invasion in 2022 - and the Yak-52 is the latest innovative project.
(Excerpt) Read more at thesun.co.uk ...
In this case, slower = better. Jets have a hard time shooting down drones because most drones fly slowly. The Yak has an extremely slow stall speed.
Sure the Spitfire and Yak do have some things in common like wings, an engine and propeller and both can get off the ground.but that's about where it ends.
The Yak lacks things like speed, good looks, cockpit space, guns and the ability to keep oil inside the engine. Yaks cost more per hour to keep topped up with oil than some LSAs fuel bills. They do fly pretty nice, have to confess. Slow, but nice.
What a waste to have them being used as suicide drones.
I'll be heart broken if I find out the Ukrainians are doing the same thing with Zlins. That may even qualify as a legit war crime.
Another good reason to end this war ASAP.
“Spitfire style? not even close. It’s a mid-70s two seated primary trainer. There is a ground attack version.
The World War II equivalent of this plane would be a BT-13, PT-19, or BT-9 (although all 3 of these are tail draggers (as is the Spitfire) and most variants of the Yak are tricycle.
Looks cutting edge to me.
In the US, it's called the Texan or the Mosquito. In Southern California, there's a squad of T6's that does flyovers at patriotic ceremonies.
Amusing to read the Daily Tabloid reports.
Another potential
F16 pilot squandered in infantry support.
These are desperate times.
The ghost of Kiev from 2022 has morphed beck 50 years in time. Meanwhile the COWARD OF KIEV ZENLINSKI is avoiding Ukraine as he lands in the Middle East.
Except these Yaks aren’t even armed. They are using the early World War I tactic of the observer potshotting from the back seat. Maybe it would be better to compare it to a Taube.
No clue if this is true or not, but it follows that if you are intercepting something low and slow, you would need to be low and slow as well to be most effective.
So it would seem like an appropriate platform for shooting down a drone.
Piloted by the Ghost of Kiev.
Trump, Le Penn, Orban, Kennedy, and Farage have all now come out and said NATO provocations started this war.
The Biden WH main talking point of Unprovoked is being destroyed by opposition candidates.
Meanwhile, another FAB3000 helped to bring the Ukrainian combat KIAs to 13710. That’s a lot of ghosts from Kiev still drawing US paychecks.
FABulous end to the war.
Shotguns, net-guns, automatic weapon fire, lasers, and repirtedly one old Russian grandmother with a stone.
Propeller driven aircraft and pilots who can handle them are cheap. Probably quite effective on drones.
FWIW, not even sure the YAK 52 actually shot the drone in question down.
Looks like the drone has no landing gear and the Russians are using a ballistic parachute to recover the drone for landing.
Whoever was operating the drone probably just popped the chute to keep the drone from being damaged.
Worst of all, the guys flying the YAK 52s here in the states are going to be even more insufferable than usual now that the Yak is a (semi) legit warbird.
Also, the weapon of choice is a machine gun, which is very cheap to use. Fire 1000 rounds at a drone to kill it and you get a $500 victory. Fire a missile at it and you get a $50-100,000 victory.
And BTW if you can get the Ukrainian AF to divert itself to acquiring and training for the slow prop plane counter cheap drone mission you have been effective in distracting the enemy.
World War I Tactics Make A Comeback As A Ukrainian Gunner In The Back Of A Propeller Plane Shoots Down A Russian Drone
April 29, 2024 - The first aerial dogfights during World War I were slow, almost comical affairs. So was last week's mid-air skirmish pitting a Ukrainian Yak-52 training plane against a Russian Orlan drone.
This method of destroying drones is cheap—but it’s not easy.
This is either a rehash of a story from a fw months go, or they had another success months later. Either way, it' s insignificant. Russia can withstand this kind of loss all day long, everyday.
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