Ukrainian aviator Roman Schemechko loved building model airplanes as a child. Russia's war against Ukraine has given him an unfortunate pretext to reexamine that passion.
Prototypes of attack and surveillance drones built by his company Besomar (White Demon) fill a spacious room in a bare office building in Lviv.
"Drones save lives," says Mr. Schemechko, now CEO. "The more drones we have, the more opportunities we have to attack the enemy."
Ukraine's drone industry is booming. A new generation of Ukrainians has been captivated by the beauty and logic of unmanned aerial vehicles, and inspired to start making drones. Many of them have a business and technical background rather than a military background. Others are former video gamers who have found their niche in military technology. The costs of the war give them all the same sense of urgency.
Ukraine has become a gigantic testing ground for drones from all over the world: the United States, Germany, Poland and other partner countries. Numerous new companies are taking shape around the technology; teams of engineers tinker with prototypes and try to sift through Department of Defense and NATO technical requirements checklists in hopes of securing a military contract.
"They come to Ukraine to understand whether a drone is a real combat drone," said Maxim Sheremet, leader of drone manufacturer Dronarnia. "It's not the same as killing in Iraq using powerful UAV drones," he adds. "In Ukraine, the war was not raging on the front lines, but in our minds. You need technology."
A blooming field
Drones became part of Ukraine's defense capabilities against Russia in 2014, when Moscow annexed Crimea and part of eastern Ukraine. They offer many benefits in asymmetric warfare, with low cost and reduced risk to military personnel at the top of the list. They can be used for surveillance, reconnaissance and precision strikes without the investments associated with manned aircraft. Even the most expensive model is several orders of magnitude cheaper than an F-16, and relatively simple models can carry enough explosives to take down a tank.
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"Drones can be more effective at surveillance than a human pilot in the aircraft," Mr. Schemechko points out. "You can fly safely and not be afraid for your life. ... One person can produce many drones that can be used to drop bombs or spy on the enemy. Training a pilot, on the other hand, takes a lot of time. You need two to three months for a pilot with a decent level of knowledge and expertise."
Drones - unlike pilots - are also easier to replace. "If a drone is destroyed and lost, a drone pilot can get a new one and move on."
The intensity of the drone war between Russia and Ukraine is forcing both sides to refine the full spectrum of related technologies and combat strategies.
In a cavernous room in Kiev, where the buzz of small drones takes off and crashes into safety nets, a group of aspiring operators are learning such techniques.
Kyrylo, an athletic, square-jawed man wearing virtual reality goggles, manipulates a remote control linked to a first-person view (FPV) drone. He trains to fly through the perspective of the camera on board the drone.
"There are many people in the infantry who want to transfer to the drone operator units because they think it is easier or because they are afraid of being shot at," said Kyrylo, who took a break from his frontline position in the Donetsk region to participate take a drone flying course in Kiev. "They just don't realize that this position and this job are very dangerous. Drone operators are indeed very valuable to the enemy as targets."
The room is full of men and women gathered around mesh cages and padded landing mats. Dozens of them sit in classroom-style rows, their faces illuminated by screens, their eyes focused on the simulated obstacle course in front of them, their hands tapping remote controls as they pretend to navigate FPV drones.
In 2014, Ukraine had only a handful of drone pilot schools. Now there are more than 30 that are part of the digital ministry's Army of Drones project. "Ukraine now has thousands more drone pilots than before the invasion," said Andrii, a drone flight instructor at the independent Boryviter Military School.
"Ukraine and Russia are like racehorses," he says. "They go nose to nose. There are times when we see the Russians stealing technologies from us. In other situations we can support it. In the FPV field we are on the same page. In terms of quantity, knowing Russia's ingenuity, we may fall behind if we do not increase our own production."
An urgent need
Mr. Sheremet has worked for military technology companies since 2012. He founded Dronarnia with the help of students passionate about creating FPV drones, just a month after Russia invaded Ukraine. Now the students are on the assembly line producing all kinds of unmanned aircraft.
But there are less than twenty mass producers in the country. Many say that current production capacity only meets about 3% of current military needs. Among those trying to scale quickly is Oleksandr Yakovenko, CEO of TAF Drones.
The company already has four factories across Ukraine - despite a sabotage attack that destroyed $300,000 worth of equipment in July. Most of the supply (90%) comes from China or Taiwan. The rest comes from suppliers in Europe and the US. "We have to make products that are cheaper than the targets," he says. "Otherwise we will not win because our enemy has more resources than our country."
Near Kiev, Yurii Dombrovskyi and his team are hard at work testing a drone model at an airfield. After a long period of tinkering with radio systems, the prototype is launched towards the sun and successfully rotated around the field. It takes time to get all the specs right: size, speed, weight, height, range, payload and, most importantly, the ability to evade Russian jamming systems.
"We need hundreds of thousands of such products - for yesterday," says Mr Dombrovskyi. "We don't have time for testing and standardization. We are in the heat of war. There is no choice for us."
Most drone manufacturers depend on China for the majority of their parts. They say they would like more guidance and supplies from allies in the West. "We need American solutions, technologies and advice," Mr. Dombrovskyi said. "We need alternatives to China because, to be honest, China is not a very friendly country."
Ukraine's drone manufacturers typically seek military contracts with the Defense Ministry. Many have an eye for or are already active on the international market. They have understood that drones are not only essential for victory in Ukraine, but have also become the weapon of the future.
"Three or four years ago, no one would have thought that drones would play such a big role in everyday warfare," said Yuri Momot, deputy general of Piranha-Tech, a company that develops jamming systems to disable Russian drones. "The war itself is a great stimulus for progress."
Reporting for this story was assisted by Oleksandr Naselenko.Related stories
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