How An Ukrainian Team of Former Volunteer IT Hobbyists Used Drones To Stop the Infamous Kiev Convoy

By Ana Dascalescu

Posted on March 31, 2022

The 40-mile long Russian convoy that wanted to attack Kiev earlier last month was stopped in its tracks by a group of IT specialists and hobbyists using drones.

In a The Guardian report, the unit’s commander, Lt Col Yaroslav Honchar, recounted how they ambushed the Russian convoy in an ambush that looks like a David-and-Goliath story.

Also read: Tech At War: How Technology Is Helping Ukraine Fight Against Russia

Certainly, the story reveals just how useful drone operators are in a modern theater of war, carrying invaluable reconnaissance missions.

Honchar’s unit, Aerozdrovidka, stopped the Russian offensive heading from the north towards Kyiv using drones that were designed by themselves.

Aerorozvidka is a group that began eight years ago as a gathering of volunteer IT specialists and hobbyists designing their own machines.

This March, they used drones of their own design to follow the Russian convoy of armored vehicles and supply trucks heading towards Kyiv.

Then, one little unit of Ukrainian fighters on quad bikes attacked the convoy during the night, as it was advancing through the forest. They took out two or three vehicles in the front, effectively stopping the Russian advance.

“The Ukrainian soldiers were equipped with night vision goggles, sniper rifles, remotely detonated mines, drones equipped with thermal imaging cameras and others capable of dropping small 1.5kg bombs. “This one little unit in the night destroyed two or three vehicles at the head of this convoy, and after that it was stuck. They stayed there two more nights, and [destroyed] many vehicles,” Honchar said.

The Russians broke the column into smaller units to try to make headway towards the Ukrainian capital, but the same assault team was able to mount an attack on its supply depot, he claimed, crippling the Russians’ capacity to advance. “The first echelon of the Russian force was stuck without heat, without oil, without bombs and without gas. And it all happened because of the work of 30 people,” Honchar said.

Also read: Russia’s Big Brain Drain: IT Workers Are “Grabbing Their Things And Literally Driving to Kazakhstan” To Escape Sanctions

“The Aerorozvidka unit also claims to have helped defeat a Russian airborne attack on Hostomel airport, just north-west of Kyiv, in the first day of the war,” adds the Guardian, saying that they also used drones to “locate, target and shell about 200 Russian paratroopers concealed at one end of the airfield.”

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