Just 8 Minutes: How Ukrainian Drones STRIKE a Russian Train

Just 8 Minutes: How Ukrainian Drones STRIKE a Russian Train,
In just 8 minutes over Zaporizhia, a coordinated swarm of FPV drones powered by 6S 2200mAh LiPo batteries executed a daring strike on a moving Russian freight train. Each carried a PG-7VL warhead, while a fixed-wing relay drone maintained command links at 915 MHz and 5.8 GHz. But the attackers faced a powerful NEBO-M VHF radar and a Shipovnik-Aero electronic warfare system, which unleashed selective interference that severed several control links. What followed was a tactical chess match between low-cost drones and multi-million-dollar air-defense assets, culminating in a high-speed approach under EW jamming and the failure of a Pantsir-S1 system caught inside its own minimum engagement range.

This video breaks down the full sequence—from radar detection and EW countermeasures, to the final impact and the catastrophic sympathetic detonation that vaporized several wagons and cut the rail line. It reveals how modern drone warfare, terrain masking, and asymmetric tactics expose the vulnerabilities of even advanced layered defense systems. Presented purely for analysis and educational context, this report highlights the evolving nature of electronic warfare, air defense, and battlefield technology in the war between Ukraine and Russia.

#ukraine #russia #zaporizhia

At 14:30 in Zaporizhia, eight drones 
had been airborne for two minutes. Each was powered by a 6S 2200mAh LiPo battery. 
This was a power source providing a total operational window of no more than eight minutes.
Each platform carried an identical 2.6-kilogram PG-7VL payload, adapted from a standard RPG-7 
munition. It was designed to generate a stream of molten copper plasma at 8,000 meters per second.
But the operators did not know that 40 kilometers away, a stationary NEBO-M VHF Early Warning 
radar system had already detected an anomaly. Long-wave radars like the NEBO-M cannot track 
low-flying, dinner-plate-sized targets. Instead, it locked onto a much larger and higher 
target. This was a fixed-wing repeater drone, orbiting at 600 meters, acting as a relay for the 
915 MHz command link and the 5.8 GHz video feed. Targeting data from the NEBO-M was immediately 
forwarded to a stationary Electronic Warfare, or EW, asset, likely a Shipovnik-Aero 
complex. Within 90 seconds, a 10-kilowatt cone of selective interference was focused on 
the 915 MHz spectrum. This was a brute-force electronic countermeasure. It was like trying 
to drown out a whisper across a stadium field by blasting a thousand air horns at once.
For four of the eight operators, the result was immediate. The 5.8 GHz video feed in their goggles 
was still clear, but the 915 MHz command link was severed. The drones stopped responding to stick 
inputs. Their programmed failsafe systems failed completely under the powerful jamming. Those 
four drones, now deaf, went uncontrollable and were lost. Half of the attack element was gone.
The four remaining operators reacted according to protocol. They drastically changed their flight 
profile, dropping the drones from 15 meters to just 3 meters above the ground. Flying at 140 
kilometers per hour so close to the terrain was a high-risk maneuver, but it was a gamble against 
physics. By placing the mass of the earth between their drones and the jamming source, the operators 
successfully used terrain masking, and their flickering command links became stable again.
A general warning about drone activity was sent over the opposing radio network. The 
locomotive engineer on the target train received the message. The train crew pushed the 
throttle further. The heavy cargo train slowly accelerated from 55 to 65 kilometers per hour.
This acceleration created an instant calculus problem for the FPV operators. Each kilometer 
per hour faster meant the intended intercept point shifted 18 meters further away for every 
minute of flight time. The operators had to abandon their straight-line paths and fly in wider 
pursuit curves, burning precious battery power. The four remaining drones closed to 4.5 kilometers 
from the moving target. At a railway junction ahead, a stationary Pantsir-S1 short-range air 
defense system, which had been electronically silent, activated its 1RS2-1E tracking radar. 
The 15-million-dollar system locked onto the four approaching threats, and its crew immediately 
switched to the twin 2A38M 30-millimeter cannons. The turret spun and the cannons went active, 
firing 80 rounds per second. The system was not trying to hit the drones directly; that 
was statistically impossible. Instead, it fired high-explosive fragmentation munitions 
with proximity fuses, programming each 30-millimeter shell to detonate and create a wall 
of tungsten fragments. The lead drone flew right into that ballistic calculation and vanished in 
a flash of orange static. Three drones remained. The next two drones immediately took 
defensive maneuvers, diving and swerving, forcing the Pantsir’s computer to recalculate. 
But the operator of the third remaining drone made a split-second decision: they did not evade. The 
operator pulled back on the control stick, sending their drone straight up in a steep vertical climb, 
offering the most predictable target profile. The Pantsir’s targeting logic took the 
bait. This was a classic error in air defense doctrine. The system’s crew committed to 
the easiest target to track, not the closest one. A second burst of 30-millimeter fire 
disintegrated the sacrificial drone. The gambit worked. The maneuver forced the 
Pantsir system to switch targets, fire, evaluate, and then begin a new acquisition 
cycle. This created a tactical gap—a critical 6-second pause. During that 6-second pause, the 
two remaining drones had covered 233 meters. Both were now inside the Pantsir’s minimum 
effective range. The 30-millimeter cannons could no longer depress their barrels low 
enough to track them. The 15-million-dollar system was defeated by basic trigonometry. The 
last two drones were now clear on their run. Suddenly, local EW assets flooded the 5.8 GHz 
video frequency. In the operators’ goggles, the analog video feed began to tear into lines 
of static. Ten seconds of flight time remained. The operators could no longer see the target. 
Relying on muscle memory and the last ‘image memory’, both operators stabilized their 
axis, pushed the throttle to 100 percent, and locked the sticks. The first drone impacted the 
coupler between the locomotive and the first car, severing the engine from the train. 
Two seconds later, the second drone impacted the now-slowing ammunition car.
A reconnaissance drone, orbiting from a safe distance of 15 kilometers, recorded the 
entire sequence of events in the thermal and visual spectrum. The impact from the second drone 
was not an ordinary explosion. The PG-7VL warhead penetrated the wagon’s steel, and two seconds 
later, triggered a sympathetic detonation of the payload inside. There was a blinding white flash 
on the thermal sensor, followed by a fireball that climbed hundreds of meters. The ammunition wagon 
itself, along with four other wagons around it, were not just destroyed—they vanished instantly. 
The wagons vaporized. The pressure wave tore the steel rails from their sleepers and created a 
three-meter deep crater, effectively cutting the logistics route indefinitely.
Conclusively proving that expensive, layered air defense architecture is extremely 
vulnerable. Systems worth tens of millions of dollars are designed to counter single, 
high-performance threats like fighter jets or cruise missiles. Those systems proved to be 
doctrinally incapable of dealing with saturation by extremely low-cost threats in large numbers. 
The Pantsir system’s reliance on a predictable targeting cycle—that fatal 6-second gap between 
re-acquisition—was an exploitable flaw, and it was exploited with devastating effect.
Watch your six.