Detailed New Photos Of Russia's 'Hunter' Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle Emerge: Our Analysis - russian Okhotnik.jpg ...

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Yesterday, we reported on what appeared to be the first image of Russia's
much-touted, but never yet to be seen Okhotnik, or Hunter, unmanned combat air
vehicle (UCAV) that had been in development for years and was supposed to start
flight testing soon. Now, just a day later, new images have surfaced that offer
up a much better look at the aircraft, as well as new insights into the drone's
potential capabilities and design limitations.

Make sure to read our past piece of Hunter to get up to speed, but suffice it to
say that these images show an impressively large UCAV. As you can see, it dwarfs
the relatively large snow plow tractor that is pulling it, leaving the
impression that it is similar overall in size to a medium weight fighter,
although shorter in length and significantly longer in wingspan. Its dimensions
appear to be loosely analogous to Northrop Grumman's X-47B, if not larger in
terms of wingspan as it doesn't appear to feature the X-47B's 'cranked kite'
planform. The X-47B was roughly 38 feet long with a 62 foot wingspan.

Far more valuable than the forward hemisphere photos is this one from the rear.
The aircraft is powered by a full-sized fighter jet engine that could
potentially include afterburning capability based on the nozzle installation.
This would be helpful for taking off at high gross weights, but beyond that, it
would have questionable utility. The engine being used is unknown, but the
Saturn AL-31F series used by the Flanker family of aircraft would be a logical
choice. It is possible that a derivative of the more powerful AL-41F that is
still somewhat in development could be used in the future, which may eliminate
the need for an afterburner.

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Finally, I want to address some questions I have been asked after our first
piece regarding how Russia was able to make such an aircraft in the first place.
Knowing what we now know from these pictures, I don't see how this is far
outside Russia's aerospace capabilities. Nearly every major power is involved
with some sort of UCAV program at this time. China has a list of them ongoing
and these are just the ones we are allowed to know about. So, it's only logical
that Russia, still one of the world's most prolific military aircraft
manufacturers, wade into this capability area as well.

Flying the aircraft and turning it into a working and effective weapon is
another story entirely. Just developing the command and control software and
data-link architecture will be a significant and expensive challenge for Russia.
But, it is important to remember that Russia was able to examine the RQ-170
Sentinel that fell into Iranian hands. In fact, they likely led the effort to
exploit every bit of technology and know-how they could from the Skunk
Works-built stealthy flying wing. Do not underestimate how much of an impact
this had on their ability to at least know where they needed to invest
development dollars to make a similar system of their own a reality one day.

With all that said, it's exciting that we are already getting multiple decent
quality views of Sukhoi's long-awaited unmanned creation. For now, we will leave
the analysis there, but we will update this post throughout the day with new
information as it comes available, as well as key takeaways from it.


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