4 ms·

Absolutely absurd claim. It's not expensive at all. Iran may or may not be providing technological assistance, but US amateur enthusiasts and mom and pop chines

Absolutely absurd claim. It's not expensive at all. Iran may or may not be providing technological assistance, but US amateur enthusiasts and mom and pop chinese resellers definitely are. No Iranian conspiracy here or needed. Drones are not magic genies unavailable to all but the elite. Drones, including these fixed wing models, are kid tech these days, including drones with 1000 mile ranges that can carry bombs that can destroy a facility.

yyyk 7y ago
BS. Even if you magically had a 1000 mile drone (extremely unlikely even for US 'amateurs', much less wartorn Yemen), it can't do anything without guidance, which they can't provide. Everybody, but Everybody, knows Iran is responsible for this.
- snovv_crash 7y ago
  Guidance is easy. Throw on Ardupilot with a preprogrammed mission onto an EPP wing. 100km of range with 2kg payload is possible for under $1000.
  - yyyk 7y ago
    So you say can get a small range with a tiny bomb (nowhere near enough to cause this damage), and also without any real guidance (Preprogrammed mission isn't real guidance. Deviations are very likely to kill the mission). All this while (presumably) not living in a wartorn county. Now guess how hard it must be for the Houthis. Either Iran did it directly or had so much involvement it's practically the same.
    - snovv_crash 7y ago
      Ardupilot (and a number of other open source flight stacks) do 'real' guidance. GNSS based, or optical flow, or whatever other source you want. You can program drones (multirotor, fixed wing, vtol, whatever) to go to exact coordinates, following whatever flight paths you want. This is something a teenager can put together in a weekend with parts ordered from banggood or gearbest or any other number of chinese webstores. For a 1000km range, sure, maybe they didn't do it themselves, but nothing stopping them from just ordering slightly larger off-the-shelf drones from China. But lots of small drones is cheap and easy, and harder to stop. Source: I work in the commercial drone industry. Edit: here's an off-the-shelf drone with 1000km range, costs $4.5k: https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-4450mm-uav-ht-tail-plane-platform-frame-kit/ https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-4450mm-uav-ht-tail-pl...
      - droithomme 7y ago
        That's a really cool and super inexpensive long range drone! Thanks. The Houthi models are jet powered, cruise at 450mph, and can fly for 2 hrs on 500 lbs of jet fuel, which requires a 10 cubic foot volume fuel tank. The interior of the fuselage has around 70 cubic feet of capacity, which is more than enough for the fuel (even enough for a 900 mile each way round trip if desired), the controls, and the payload. They have a solid fuel rocket booster on the back as they are sled launched. Once up to flight speed the jet takes over and the rocket element drops off. They are really cool drones and within the scope of what the serious amateur community in the US and elsewhere is experimenting with. Some guys even are building their own jet engines from scratch. The guidance systems are a done deal. Can DIY or can buy off the shelf. My kids build drones and program the guidance systems on them themselves (one started at age 8). It's fun and there's even online classes telling you everything you need to know. Ours currently use inertial guidance and GPS and have no problem getting somewhere with great accuracy. We've also got a celestial navigation system under development which works even when there is no GPS. Houthis mentioned they have local assist at the end of the flight which makes sense to deal with GPS jamming. The region they hit contains significant Shia populations who hate Saudi Arabia and have even revolted against the Kingdom in the past. Once you're at the last mile if for any reason there's a question about the target, local observers can and do provide guidance assist. People saying Houthis are too dumb or primitive to make drones are warmongering anti-Iranians, IMHO. Houthis have systematically and incrementally been developing this technology for years now to defend their homeland and have shown off their drones. There's no question the Houthi drones have the capabilities we are seeing.
- fit2rule 7y ago
  Evidence: Provide some, or quit it with your BS war-mongering against Iran.
  - yyyk 7y ago
    Gee I don't know. Maybe the Saudis bombed themselves. What better way to deal with oil-addiction then to blow up your own infrastructure? Or maybe its their arch-enemy which has the motive, opportunity, ability and past history of doing those things. Too reasonable, I guess. I am not "war-mongering" - the only warmongers here are the people who blow up stuff.

yyyk 7y ago

BS. Even if you magically had a 1000 mile drone (extremely unlikely even for US 'amateurs', much less wartorn Yemen), it can't do anything without guidance, which they can't provide. Everybody, but Everybody, knows Iran is responsible for this.

snovv_crash 7y ago
Guidance is easy. Throw on Ardupilot with a preprogrammed mission onto an EPP wing. 100km of range with 2kg payload is possible for under $1000.
- yyyk 7y ago
  So you say can get a small range with a tiny bomb (nowhere near enough to cause this damage), and also without any real guidance (Preprogrammed mission isn't real guidance. Deviations are very likely to kill the mission). All this while (presumably) not living in a wartorn county. Now guess how hard it must be for the Houthis. Either Iran did it directly or had so much involvement it's practically the same.
  - snovv_crash 7y ago
    Ardupilot (and a number of other open source flight stacks) do 'real' guidance. GNSS based, or optical flow, or whatever other source you want. You can program drones (multirotor, fixed wing, vtol, whatever) to go to exact coordinates, following whatever flight paths you want. This is something a teenager can put together in a weekend with parts ordered from banggood or gearbest or any other number of chinese webstores. For a 1000km range, sure, maybe they didn't do it themselves, but nothing stopping them from just ordering slightly larger off-the-shelf drones from China. But lots of small drones is cheap and easy, and harder to stop. Source: I work in the commercial drone industry. Edit: here's an off-the-shelf drone with 1000km range, costs $4.5k: https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-4450mm-uav-ht-tail-plane-platform-frame-kit/ https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-4450mm-uav-ht-tail-pl...
    - droithomme 7y ago
      That's a really cool and super inexpensive long range drone! Thanks. The Houthi models are jet powered, cruise at 450mph, and can fly for 2 hrs on 500 lbs of jet fuel, which requires a 10 cubic foot volume fuel tank. The interior of the fuselage has around 70 cubic feet of capacity, which is more than enough for the fuel (even enough for a 900 mile each way round trip if desired), the controls, and the payload. They have a solid fuel rocket booster on the back as they are sled launched. Once up to flight speed the jet takes over and the rocket element drops off. They are really cool drones and within the scope of what the serious amateur community in the US and elsewhere is experimenting with. Some guys even are building their own jet engines from scratch. The guidance systems are a done deal. Can DIY or can buy off the shelf. My kids build drones and program the guidance systems on them themselves (one started at age 8). It's fun and there's even online classes telling you everything you need to know. Ours currently use inertial guidance and GPS and have no problem getting somewhere with great accuracy. We've also got a celestial navigation system under development which works even when there is no GPS. Houthis mentioned they have local assist at the end of the flight which makes sense to deal with GPS jamming. The region they hit contains significant Shia populations who hate Saudi Arabia and have even revolted against the Kingdom in the past. Once you're at the last mile if for any reason there's a question about the target, local observers can and do provide guidance assist. People saying Houthis are too dumb or primitive to make drones are warmongering anti-Iranians, IMHO. Houthis have systematically and incrementally been developing this technology for years now to defend their homeland and have shown off their drones. There's no question the Houthi drones have the capabilities we are seeing.
fit2rule 7y ago
Evidence: Provide some, or quit it with your BS war-mongering against Iran.
- yyyk 7y ago
  Gee I don't know. Maybe the Saudis bombed themselves. What better way to deal with oil-addiction then to blow up your own infrastructure? Or maybe its their arch-enemy which has the motive, opportunity, ability and past history of doing those things. Too reasonable, I guess. I am not "war-mongering" - the only warmongers here are the people who blow up stuff.