【Military Subplane】Author: Lu Zhi
Israel has used many of its main battle weapons during the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but at the same time, some new and unique weapons have emerged. A recent online video shows Israel's so-called Firefly urban warfare drone in action, which is quite unique in appearance. So what is the specific performance of this kind of UAV, and what impact will it have on the development of UAVs?
▲ Image source: Internet
The Firefly drone has a certain connection with the Spike series missiles used in Israel, using many of the same sensors and other components, but from the appearance of the so-called Firefly drone is completely different from the traditional drone. The Firefly uses a coaxial inverted structure to drive a small propeller, which, according to Israel, significantly reduces noise and makes it less likely to be spotted by enemies on the battlefield. In attack mode, the Firefly can hold a 350-gram high-explosive warhead, which is more powerful than a regular grenade. When performing tasks in reconnaissance mode, the battery life is 15~30 minutes, and the combat area can be continuously monitored. The reason why it is called an urban drone is because the Firefly drone has good mobility and agility, and can accurately attack targets in the room, and can also attack living targets behind cover over cover.
▲ Image source: Internet
In terms of basic data, under normal circumstances, the range of the Firefly can reach 1 km, and the maximum flight speed reaches 60 km/h, which is basically equivalent to a normal driving car. And when attacking in a dive, the maximum speed can even reach 70 kilometers per hour. In addition, this drone is also more convenient to carry, the total combat weight is only about three kilograms, and it can be launched by a vehicle-mounted launcher or carried by infantry independently.
▲ Image source: Internet
In every respect, the design of the Firefly drone is quite good. The Israeli side said that the Israeli Ministry of Defense had ordered the Firefly drone as early as 2020 and began to use it in September 2020. And this quite good drone has also aroused the interest of the United States, which allegedly evaluated the drone last year, and the interest was quite strong. In addition to the United States, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom also evaluated the drone, and the Firefly drone was well received. However, from a domestic point of view, this UAV still has the disadvantage of high price, after all, if you want to use this UAV widely in war, especially in urban warfare, then its price should be reduced as much as possible, so this coaxial inversion structure is not necessarily the preferred structure of this UAV, and it does not have a particularly big impact on the development of UAV.
▲ Image source: Internet
In "Transformers 4" released in 2014, the human army actually used a drone with a structure similar to that of fireflies to monitor and detect Transformers. It's just that the drone flight method in the movie seems to have a bug, it should be head up and tail down close to the firefly, but the drone flight method in the movie is the same as that of a general helicopter, or close to a dragonfly, and the tail even has a ducted tail rotor similar to a Comanche helicopter, and it is obvious that the longitudinally arranged rotor cannot fly like this, which also shows that there is still a big difference between the design and reality of the movie. It is also unknown whether Israel borrowed from this film, compared to the drones in the movie that are only used for reconnaissance, fireflies can be attacked, and naturally have a wider use.
▲ Image source: Internet
Source: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/israels-firefly-urban-warfare-drone-spotted-in-jenin
When: December 18, 2023 ET
Location: Israel