Russia launched around 350 Banderol and Dan-T weapons in a month, UAF
Photo: Yurii Ihnat, head of the Communications Department of the Ukrainian Air Force Command (Getty Images)
Russian forces used around 350 Banderol and Dan-T munitions over the past month. That is roughly ten times fewer than the jet-powered drones Russia uses to attack Ukraine, said Yurii Ihnat, head of the Communications Department of the Ukrainian Air Force Command.
According to him, the S-8000, known as the Banderol, and the Dan-T are weapons that can be classified as drone missiles or loitering munitions. One of their key features is that they are launched from airborne platforms.
These weapons have a range of approximately 600 kilometers. Initially, Russia launched them from Orion reconnaissance-strike drones, but later began using helicopters for this purpose.
Ihnat said it was also possible that Russia was working on the capability to launch these munitions from aircraft.
Can Russia produce more of these munitions?
The number of Banderol and Dan-T munitions currently in use is significantly lower than that of jet-powered UAVs. Ihnat believes Russia may not yet be able to scale up production of these weapons at the same pace.
“For now, it seems they cannot scale up production to the same extent. But we do not know all their capabilities and resources,” he added.
Russia began using Banderol munitions about a year and a half ago. Initially, they were used only in isolated cases, including over the Black Sea and in the direction of the Kherson and Mykolaiv regions.
Later, Russia increased production to some extent and began using these weapons alongside jet-powered drones.
“They have now increased production of these weapons to some extent, alongside jet-powered UAVs. But the Banderol will eventually be replaced by a newer version, the Dan-T. That is how we distinguish between them,” Ihnat concluded.
In September, Ukraine’s defense technology cluster Brave1 reported that Ukrainian developers had created systems to intercept Russian Banderol drone missiles.
One of these systems is already being used to destroy such targets, at a cost significantly lower than the price of the Russian munition itself.
