NATIONAL HARBOR, Md.—A network of low-cost acoustic sensors developed and in use by Ukrainian forces to detect and counter low flying one-way drones launched by Russian forces is so effective that the commander of U.S. Air Forces in Europe is lobbying allied air chiefs to pursue similar technologies.
Gen. James Hecker said he has “been pushing this for a while for some NATO countries to acquire technology to detect the “low, slow, low-radar cross section one-way UAVs [and] cruise missiles.”
Hecker said he hosted the Ukrainian developers at Ramstein Air Base in Germany and again in Romania to demonstrate the sensor system for allies to witness, and they “saw that it worked, and I think it’s getting a lot of interest,” he said during a media roundtable. “And the good news is, this is a cheap solution.”
Now it comes down to the allies to “pony up, get some money” to buy the sensors, he told reporters at the Air Force Association Air, Space & Cyber Conference. Following an incursion into Latvia’s air space this month by Russian drones, Hecker said he visited the country’s defense minister to urge him “to put these sensors out there.” He mentioned the Baltics, Poland, Romania, and Finland as countries that need these cheap but effective sensor solutions.
Developed by two Ukrainian physicists, the original sensors cost $300 each, Hecker said. Ukraine has deployed 9,500 of the sensors, in what it calls Sky Fortress. The sensors consist of a microphone connected to a cell phone mounted on poles installed four to five kilometers apart that can listen for drones passing 8,000 to 10,000 feet overhead.
Ukraine is on the third modification of the sensors so costs have risen a little but, at the original cost, Romania could deploy them across their country for about $6 million, the same expense as a radar, Hecker said.
For one-way drones or cruise missiles flying two hundred or so feet above the surface, radar would need to be deployed about every 10 nautical miles to detect incoming threats due to Earth’s curvature, which Hecker said is unaffordable.
Users may not get a “target quality track” from the triangulated sensor data but it is enough to send an aircraft to intercept a target with a missile or a mobile anti-aircraft artillery team to shoot it down, Hecker said.
“Now that is on the right side of the cost curve,” Hecker said of the use of AAA fire to take out long-range drones.
Hecker has been evangelizing five operational focus areas he deems necessary for air superiority. One is integrated air and missile defense, which is necessary to protect all of NATO, he said. This is getting more difficult because of the proliferation of one-way drones and ballistic missiles that Russia is using, he said.
These one-way unmanned aircraft systems cost $10,000 to $20,000 each and defeating them with $1 million missiles is unaffordable “in the long run” he said.
At AFA, Hecker said he “a lot of my dealings with industry” involve low-cost solutions to counter the one-way drones and cruise missiles. So far, he likes the response.
“And luckily, industry’s been hearing this, and they’re starting to offer some solutions,” he said. “They’re not mass. They’re not in quantity right now, but the development is ongoing, and I think they see this issue, and I think they’re really partnering well. So, it was good to see with my updates that I got from them earlier this week and I’ll continue through the rest of the week.”