Ukraine deploys drone to rescue wounded soldiers from front-line gray zones
A Ukrainian soldier who spent two days stranded with a severe foot wound near the Russian border says an aerial rescue drone was the only reason he made it out alive, according to the Associated Press.
Snapshot
Ukraine's 475th Separate Assault Regiment, known as Code 9.2, has begun using the StarGate drone to pull wounded troops from positions too dangerous for ground evacuation. The six-rotor aircraft, fitted with an enclosed stretcher capsule, has now completed two rescue missions near the Russian border, according to the regiment and reporting by the Associated Press.
Key points
- The soldier: A 24-year-old from the 1st Territorial Defense Brigade, identified only by his call sign "Izyum" for security reasons, said his foot injury left him unable to walk the 20 kilometers needed to reach safety.
- The drone: StarGate, built by Ukrainian company SkyFall, can carry 150 kilograms and uses signal jammers and autonomous navigation to work around Russian electronic warfare, the manufacturer said.
- The rescue: The flight out of the gray zone, roughly 5 kilometers from the Russian border, took less than 15 minutes, despite tangled fiber-optic cable in the landing field that worried soldiers on the ground.
- What's next: Code 9.2 commander "Flint" said the regiment plans to stand up a dedicated medical aviation unit focused on airborne casualty evacuation.
Quick take
Izyum, who hopes to return to beekeeping once the war ends, told the AP he wants aerial evacuation expanded because so many wounded troops can't walk out under heavy shelling. For readers who track battlefield medicine, this is a clear sign that casualty evacuation is moving toward unmanned systems built specifically to reach soldiers that ground crews can't safely get to.
Read the full story: military.com