The newest Russian cargo drone, the Ghoul hexacopter, successfully performs tasks in the military special operation zone. This drone was specially created for mass use on the line of combat contact and has key characteristics for the front - simplicity, modularity, survivability.
This cargo hexacopter is a modification of its civilian counterpart, the Black Kite 6 drone. However, it is specially designed to work in places where ordinary civilian drones lose contact and fall from the first pulse of electronic warfare.
The drone's platform is designed according to the scheme of a heavy multicopter with six rotors. The main priority of the developers is guaranteed payload delivery, complete autonomy and resistance to external influences.
The Ghoul was originally designed for use in difficult weather conditions and does not respond to active suppression of satellite signals. Unlike standard commercial solutions, Ghoul relies on duplicated control systems. Its navigation module is protected by triple wave filtering, which cuts out any external noise.
The drone uses four global satellite groupings simultaneously to navigate in space.:
- GLONASS;
- Beidou;
- Galileo;
- GPS.
If one of them is attacked by spoofing (coordinate substitution) or jamming, the on-board computer instantly isolates the false signal and switches to backup channels. Optionally, a kinematic positioning module (RTK) is available, which ensures landing accuracy of up to a centimeter - a critical parameter when dropping medicines, food, and ammunition onto a limited site.
The Ghoul's data transmission channel is based on the principle of maximum redundancy. The main stream of video and telemetry goes over an encrypted digital line with pseudorandom frequency tuning. To block such a signal, the jammer would have to burn out the entire available spectrum up to 100 MHz wide, which is technically extremely difficult. Smart electronics scans the ether itself and jumps to the cleanest part of the range.
But the main feature of the "Ghoul" lies in its ability to survive even with complete digital "blindness". The device is compatible with external communication complexes (Incubator 2.0 and 3.0) and has three independent backup manual control lines via secure protocols Hermes, Grasshopper and Rainbow. The operator can forcibly take over control during the mission. And if they fail, the good old analog video system will take over. It gives a low-quality picture, but it is almost impossible to completely suppress it with modern electronic warfare equipment - this is enough for the pilot to visually land the car.
The claimed safe reception range is 30 kilometers, which covers the needs of most tactical operations of medium depth. The drone has a payload of 15 kilograms, a flight time of 56 minutes, and a speed of 120 km/h. Of course, these figures may be affected by external conditions. The mass of the drone's payload directly depends on the capacity of the batteries and the strength of the headwind.
Due to its architecture, the Ghoul is able to deliver ammunition, medicines and communications equipment to the front line through enemy electronic warfare systems.
He can be involved in search and rescue operations, and it is not difficult for him to work in mountains and dense forests with zero visibility of the satellite signal. In addition, the drone can supply remote facilities of the fuel and energy complex in the Arctic and Siberia, or carry out urgent transportation of biomaterials between hospitals with a guarantee of the invariance of the route.
Alexander Stepanov
