Iran Presents a Dozen New Long-Range Combat Drones

Iran unveiled 12 new long-range combat drones on Saturday in Tehran.

“The drones possess automatic landing and take-off capabilities. They will join the Air Force soon. We will see a big jump in production this year,” Chief of the Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF) Aziz Nasirzadeh said during the unveiling ceremony.

The Iranian military also took the delivery of 3 types of locally-developed drones of which one of them is jet-powered.

“As the drones have been equipped with various types of bombs and missiles, they can be utilized by the forces in combat missions,” Defence Minister Brig. Gen. Amir Hatami was quoted as saying by Tasnim.

The drones, said to include the Karrar (‘Striker), Ababil-3 (‘Swallow-3’) and an unnamed ‘multipurpose jet-engine-powered’ drone, have operational ranges of up to 1,000 km, flight ceilings of 40,000-45,000 feet, and a flight duration of between three and eight hours.

Iran has been increasingly developing drone technology in the recent years. At MAKS 2019 Airshow in Russia, it unveiled a jet-powered stealth attack drone. An upgraded version of Farpad hand-launched drone with electronic warfare capabilities was revealed a few months later.