Ukrainian company Robotic Complexes is developing CASEEVAK, an armored module that lets the Murakha unmanned ground vehicle carry wounded soldiers off the battlefield, the company told Militarnyi on 28 October. The casualty rides in a closed capsule with ventilation, heating, lighting, and a first-aid kit, and side and rear doors let medics load and reach the soldier from any side.
Drones that can fly long distances pose a threat to both wounded soldiers and the crews evacuating them, making transportation the main challenge, said Ukrainian military medic Daryna Boiko, The Independent reported. Developers are looking for new ways to counter this threat. The current Murakha model is being equipped with passive anti-drone protection elements, the developers say.
An armored capsule that keeps the wounded connected
After a wounded soldier is loaded onto an evacuation platform, it is important not only to transport them to a safe location but also to protect them and monitor their condition during transit.
The module is built around a closed armored capsule made of 3.5 mm-thick Armox 500T steel with an inner lining of HDPE 1000, the media outlet reports. Side and rear doors allow the wounded to be loaded from different directions and accessed during evacuation.
A military personnel member inside the CASEEVAK module of the Murakha UGV. Photo: Robotic Complexes company
To enable the operator to monitor the person inside and maintain contact with them, the capsule is equipped with a camera with day and night channels and two-way audio communication. The system can be controlled via ELRS, LTE, Starlink, or fiber-optic communications. Militarnyi reports that even if the capsule is detached from the main platform, it retains two independent communication channels.
The developers are also working to integrate vital-signs monitoring systems intended to provide medical personnel with information about the wounded person’s condition during transport.
An electric platform and protection against FPV drones
The evacuation module requires a platform capable of carrying it as it moves through dangerous areas. The Murakha is equipped with two electric motors, delivering a combined torque of 1,600 N·m, and a 35 kWh battery. The system’s stated range is up to 80 km, according to the media outlet.
Another area of development is protection against drones. Measures intended to protect the system include net launchers and electronic warfare (EW) equipment. However, work on a protective cage against FPV drones is still ongoing, according to the report.
The company has already conducted ballistic tests of the armor steel at a distance of 50 meters, using ammunition of various calibers, Militarnyi reports.
The Murakha-Mini logistics platform
The same company previously developed the Murakha-Mini logistics platform. Ukrainian military personnel began using it on the front line to deliver equipment, provisions and other supplies, Militarnyi reported on 24 October 2025.
Ukraine’s Murakha-Mini unmanned ground vehicle. 2025. Photo: Robotic Complexes company
The UGV can carry up to 250 kg and travel up to 40 km on a single charge, the media outlet reported. During one combat mission, it transported 150 kg of cargo and towed a six-metre platform carrying another drone and provisions, covering 16 km in one direction, Militarnyi reported.
Zaporizhzhia experienced a record number of Russian FPV drone attacks on 29 October, injuring 14 people, including a 14-year-old boy, regional authorities said.
Russian forces used FPV drones and multiple-launch rocket systems to attack civilian infrastructure, targeting municipal transport and damaging residential buildings, warehouses, and cars, prosecutors said.
Zaporizhzhia reports record FPV drone attacks
Zaporizhzhia Regional Military Administration head Mykhailo Semikin said Zaporizhzhia had experienced a record number of FPV drone attacks on Thursday. After meeting with military officials, he said the authorities were aware of the situation and relevant services and Ukrainian defenders were responding.
He said Russian forces had “changed their tactics and modified their drones,” adding that Ukrainian military personnel were working on countermeasures to address the new threats.
Semikin urged residents to remain calm, heed air raid alerts, and exercise particular caution.
Russian forces launched a record number of FPV drone attacks on Zaporizhzhia on 29 October, repeatedly targeting civilian public transport.
Drones struck a municipal bus, a minibus, and a trolleybus. Four people were injured in the bus attack alone. Across the city, at least 14… pic.twitter.com/WfemZSh7yr
The attacks included strikes on a municipal bus, a minibus, and a trolleybus, according to Semikin.
In the morning, a Russian FPV drone struck a municipal bus, injuring four people.
In a separate attack, Russian forces struck 15 vehicles, a warehouse building, and a power line, sparking a fire and damaging a nearby apartment building. Two men, aged 41 and 66, were injured.
At around midday, another FPV drone hit a minibus in central Zaporizhzhia, injuring one person.
Later, a Russian drone struck a municipal trolleybus, critically injuring a 56-year-old woman and lightly injuring two other women, aged 71 and 66.
Russian attacks on Zaporizhzhia injured two men, aged 41 and 66.
The strikes set four cars and an open area on fire, damaged a warehouse, and damaged four cars and four buses.
Zaporizhzhia lies relatively close to the front line in southern Ukraine, leaving the city exposed to Russian attacks with weapons that can be used at shorter ranges, including FPV drones and multiple-launch rocket systems.
The proximity allows Russian forces to threaten civilian infrastructure more easily without relying solely on long-range missiles or drones.
Prosecutors investigate suspected war crime
The Zaporizhzhia Regional Prosecutor’s Office said it had opened a war crimes investigation. Investigators from the Security Service of Ukraine’s regional directorate are conducting the pretrial investigation.
The casualty count and damage reports were preliminary, and authorities said information was still being updated as the attacks continued.
Russian attacks kill civilians in several Ukrainian cities
Zaporizhzhia was not the only major city hit by Russian attacks on 29 October. In Dnipro, a Russian strike on the railway station killed at least 14 people.
In Chernihiv, two teenage girls were killed and 23 people injured, including four children. In Kremenchuk, Poltava Oblast, three people were killed and 15 injured, including three children.
The attacks damaged residential buildings and civilian infrastructure in all three cities.
Iran claims to have brought down what looks to be a U.S.-made MQM-170C Outlaw G2 drone largely intact. A video shows it has a notable feature on top of its nose. In U.S. military use today, Outlaw-series drones are best known as an aerial target for use in training and testing.
The footage in question, and the accompanying claims, should be treated with caution given that the regime in Tehran and the country’s media outlets do routinely make exaggerated and unverified claims. That being said, so far, the footage looks to be credible. Furthermore, the U.S. military has pushed back on Iran’s version of events, but has not explicitly denied having lost one of these drones in the region recently.
For its part, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) says it captured the MQM-170-series drone following what it described as an “offensive electronic warfare operation” somewhere to the “west of the Strait of Hormuz.” The IRGC also claims that the uncrewed aircraft was conducting reconnaissance on Iranian air defenses positioned along the country’s Persian Gulf coast. At the time of writing, no firm evidence has been provided to support either of these assertions. The IRGC has released the aforementioned video, seen below, which it says shows the drone being tracked via an infrared camera, as well as after its recovery.
#Iran / #USA: Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (#IRGC) Navy captured a US Drone after intercepting it with EW Systems.
The Drone captured by the IRGC Navy appears to be Griffon Aerospace Outlaw G2 “MQM-170C” UAV. pic.twitter.com/Xw6JYOu1s6
“In the past weeks and months, the IRGC has repeatedly lied out of desperation, and today is no different,” U.S. Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, spokesperson for U.S. Central Command, told TWZ when asked about the specific Iranian claims.
“We’re not going to waste our time. U.S. forces remain vigilant and laser-focused on our assigned missions,” Hawkins said in response to a follow-up question about whether CENTCOM could confirm or deny the loss of an MQM-170-series drone for any reason.
As an aside, Iran recovered an Anduril Dive-LD uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) largely intact last month in what the IRGC claimed had been a “complex intelligence and operational action.” U.S. authorities ultimately confirmed the loss of the advanced UUV, but said it was the result of a malfunction.
As mentioned, the drone seen in the IRGC video does look to be an MQM-170C, or at least a closely-related variant thereof. It has an interesting feature on top of its nose: a single forward-looking aperture. This is something that is commonly associated with staring-type optics, which drones often use to aid with navigation. There is a possibility that it could be a seeker, if the drone were to be configured as a one-way-attack munition, but this seems unlikely.
Additional views of the nose end of the drone Iran says it captured, with the ‘staring’ aperture plainly visible. Iranian media captures via XA stock picture of an MQM-170C drone in U.S. military service in its typical configuration as an aerial target. USNAnother picture of U.S. MQM-170C target drones offering additional views of their noses. USAF
MQM-170C’s manufacturer, Griffon Aerospace, which refers to this design internally as the Outlaw Gen 2 (G2), does say on its website that it can be configured as “an inexpensive payload development platform offering great endurance, payload size, weight, and power.” The company’s website also says that the target configuration of the G2 has a gross weight of 150 pounds, but that this can grow to 225 pounds when used as a more general-purpose drone.
The drone, which is nearly 11 feet long and has a wingspan of 16 feet, otherwise has a stated maximum endurance of eight hours, top speed of 126 knots, and the ability to reach altitudes of more than 16,000 feet. The design is propelled by a 2-cylinder, 2-stroke combustion engine driving a single pusher propeller. The G2 gets into the air via a catapult-type launcher and can be recovered, either after a glide-in landing on suitable terrain or via parachute.
An MQM-170C target drone seen being launched via catapult. USN
Griffon Aerospace also offers an ‘expanded’ G2E version with fixed tricycle landing gear as an “open and customizable platform for ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] missions, subsystem testing, and R&D [research and development].” This version has a lower maximum takeoff weight and total endurance compared to the baseline G2, according to the company’s website. The IRGC video does not show any evidence of landing gear, but it could have broken away when the drone came down.
The landing-gear-equipped Outlaw G2E. Griffon Aerospace
The larger Outlaw family, which traces back to the early 2000s, also includes the Gen 1 MQM-170A, which has a completely different design from the subsequent G2 drone. Griffon also developed a derivative of the Gen 1 design with a twin-boom tail, called the Outlaw Boomer, which the U.S. military designated the MQM-170B. There is also a twin-engine, twin-boom derivative of the Outlaw G2 that the U.S. military has at least tested in the past.
A twin-engine, twin-boom derivative of the Outlaw G2, seen here in U.S. Army markings. Griffon Aerospace
This brings us to the additional matter of a contract the U.S. Army awarded to Griffon Aerospace, valued at nearly $68 million, for the procurement of a Gen 3 version of the Outlaw on June 3. When the Pentagon first announced this deal, it was explicitly said to be “in support of Operation Epic Fury” against Iran. That portion of the announcement was quietly deleted sometime thereafter.
“A company official declined to provide details about the Gen 3 design,” Breaking Defense reported in a story published on June 5.
On August 25, Griffon received an additional contract from the Army, valued at just under $133 million, “to procure Griffon Outlaw systems, support equipment and field service representatives for system use and employment.” That announcement made no mention of operations against Iran.
At the time of writing, Griffon Aerospace’s website does not appear to make any mention of the Gen 3 Outlaw. TWZ has reached out for more information about this drone.
Given the known breadth of Outlaw designs to date, it is possible that the Gen 3 drone is substantially, if not entirely, different from any of the existing types. At the same time, the June contract announcement does establish a link between the Outlaw family and U.S. military use outside of training and testing, and specifically as part of real-world operations aimed at Iran.
There remains the potential that Iran simply captured an Outlaw target drone that U.S. forces lost control of during training or testing in the region. The drone seen in the IRGC video lacks the high-visibility orange markings typically seen on aerial targets, though these could easily have been painted over. Iranian authorities could have still fabricated the recovery, in part or in whole, though there is no firm evidence of that at present, either.
An MQM-170C target drone belonging to the U.S. Marine Corps, seen here in use during an exercise in Saudi Arabia in 2023. USMC
Another non-U.S. operator region could also be employing versions of the Outlaw, including in non-target drone roles, such as for surveillance and reconnaissance, or as decoys.
All of this does now come amid growing signs that the United States, as well as Israel, are preparing to launch a new major campaign against Iran. As TWZ reported recently, stimulating Iranian air defenses to glean key intelligence about their current capabilities and positions would be critical in the lead-up to any such operation.
“Stimulating Iran’s air defenses is critical,” our own Tyler Rogoway wrote on X earlier this month following unconfirmed reports of unusual Israeli air activity. “By Iran operating as if a full scale attack could be coming, their air defenses can be detected, categorized and geolocated. This is absolutely critical prior to a major air operation. Surveilling them during times of lower alert does not provide the same fidelity of actionable intelligence. Knowing where those threats are and how they are operating can mean the difference of life and death and/or will help standoff munitions make their way to their targets as those defenses can be suppressed, destroyed, or avoided entirely via careful mission planning.”
I don’t know what this is, or if it’s legit BUT remember we are in a new age of misdirection, decoy and guile. Specifically using low end drone technology. There are more ways to stimulate an enemy air defense system, distract a populous, assess the flow of public info from a… https://t.co/wW7YVlbayB
“Such reports come amid an increasingly sophisticated use of low-end drones, decoys, and other forms of deception. These kinds of systems can be employed not only to stimulate adversary air defenses, but also to distract populations and probe how information moves out of a denied area. In such an environment, unusual aerial sightings should be viewed with caution — but not necessarily dismissed as irrelevant. We have been talking about how new forms of misdirection and guile will leverage relatively low-end technologies in future conflicts for many years now. While it isn’t clear if this light show in the sky over Iran was such an activity, it is certainly a reminder to keep that possibility in mind.”
It would certainly be plausible for suitably configured Outlaw drones to be in use now as another means of simulating Iranian air defenses. There is precedent even for ostensible target drones to be used operationally to deploy countermeasures and just as decoys in support of major strikes. U.S. BQM-34 Firebee target drones were notably used to spread radar-confusing chaff over the Iraqi capital Baghdad as part of the opening phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003.
Altogether, though still not definitively confirmed, Iran’s claimed recovery of an MQM-170C drone is an interesting development as the prospect that major hostilities in the region could resume soon continues to grow.
Three maritime drones struck a container ship sailing in the Black Sea off the coast of Bulgaria on Wednesday, the country's defense minister said, the latest in a string of such incidents on NATO's eastern flank
A Russian jet-powered drone hit a platform at Dnipro's railway station on 29 October, killing more than a dozen people waiting by a train, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast head Oleksandr Hanzha reported. An air alert was on, but many passengers had not left the platform. The strike came hours after another overnight Russian drone barrage across Ukraine.
Russia's air war on Ukraine leans more and more on jet-powered drones, and Ukraine's air defenses have stopped nearly 60% of the Geran-4 type over the past three months. Rail is among Russia's main targets: by late August, its strikes had damaged 492 locomotives as Moscow tried to cut Ukraine's export corridors, and in September Russia struck a passenger train near the Polish border. Civilians waiting for transport keep paying the price, and this month a Russian bomb killed 30 bus passengers in Kramatorsk.
One drone reached the platform
Around 11:00, Russia sent four jet-powered attack drones toward Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, the Air Force said. Air defenses destroyed three. The fourth hit a platform where a train stood, the state railway company Ukrzaliznytsia said.
By early afternoon, the death toll had reached 14. Another 14 people were wounded, 13 of them in hospital and six in serious condition, Hanzha reported. Among them is an 11-year-old boy. A 40-year-old man lost both legs.
Rescuers on a platform at Dnipro railway station beside an electric train after a Russian jet-powered drone strike, Dnipro, Ukraine, 29 October 2026. Photo: State Emergency Service of Ukraine
Many stayed on the platform despite the alert
Ukrzaliznytsia's monitoring team flagged heightened danger as the jet drone approached, and train crews and the station got orders to halt traffic, the company said. An evacuation was announced on the electric train to Zaporizhzhia more than 10 minutes before the strike. The driver's assistant walked through every car, and announcements told passengers to move at least 200 meters away.
“Unfortunately, despite all this, many people were in the immediate vicinity of the train at the fatal moment of the strike, hence such a significant number of dead and wounded,” Ukrzaliznytsia wrote.
Rescuers evacuating an injured civilian from a platform at Dnipro railway station beside an electric train after a Russian jet-powered drone strike, Dnipro, Ukraine, 29 October 2026. Photo: State Emergency Service of Ukraine
Kyiv ties the strike to sanctions relief
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy linked the attack to the lifting of some sanctions on Russia. “How many such terrorist strikes Russia has carried out against our people since sanctions were lifted from some Russian oligarchs and energy, instead of going for de-escalation,” he wrote. Sanctions on Moscow and its war machine must not weaken while the war goes on, he added, calling for new and stronger sanctions steps from the EU, the US, and the G7.
Explore further
Russia’s sanctioned top diplomat heads to the US to campaign against the sanctions on its war
Overnight, Russia launched 112 drones
Overnight on 29 October, Russia attacked Ukraine with 112 drones, 40 of them jet-powered, the Air Force reported. Air defenses downed or suppressed 97, but drones hit seven locations.
A man stands beside a shrapnel-marked electric train at Dnipro railway station after the Russian drone strike, with bags and the blurred bodies of victims on the platform, Dnipro, Ukraine, 29 October 2026. Photo: State Emergency Service of Ukraine
In Zaporizhzhia, a Russian FPV drone hit a municipal bus in the morning, wounding a woman and a man, Zaporizhzhia Oblast head Ivan Fedorov reported. Two later Russian strikes on the city wounded two more men and damaged 15 vehicles. In Bilenke in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, Russian attacks killed a 49-year-old man.
Drones attacked Sterlitamak in Russia’s Bashkortostan on 29 October, and smoke rose over the Bashkir Soda Company, Russian Telegram channel Astra reported, citing its open-source analysis. The city’s mayor admitted debris fell on an unnamed plant.
Ukraine’s long-range drones keep reaching deeper into the industries that feed Russia’s war. In the past five days, a nitric acid maker in Tula Oblast, a rocket-fuel rubber plant in Samara Oblast, and a titanium plant in the Urals came under attack. The Sterlitamak plant lies about 1,310 km from the front line. Drones also attacked it on 27 August, Astra says. Ukraine has not commented.
The plant is Russia’s only maker of a compound for armor fibers
The Bashkir Soda Company is Russia’s largest producer of soda ash and baking soda, and part of the Roskhim chemical holding. It is also Russia’s only maker of terephthaloyl chloride, The Insider reported, citing the company’s website. The website also mentions deliveries to the defense industry.
Smoke rises over Sterlitamak in Russia's Bashkortostan during a drone attack on 29 October 2026. Photo: Exilenova+
The compound goes into aramid fibers, Kevlar-type materials used for body armor, helmets, and armor for military vehicles and aircraft, Astra said. Astra also says the company sits on the Russian Industry and Trade Ministry’s closed register of defense enterprises.
The attack began around dawn. Ukrainian Telegram channel Exilenova+ posted footage of a drone over the city. Supernova+, another Ukrainian monitoring channel, posted the plant’s coordinates and photos of smoke. Russia’s aviation agency restricted flights at the airport of Ufa, the region’s capital. Pro-Ukrainian X account Maks 26 shared footage of the attacks on Sterlitamak and Luhansk. It also suggested that Sterlitamak’s Syntez-Kauchuk rubber plant may have been the target, and claimed a fire at the Marinovka air base in Volgograd Oblast.
After the attack by Ukrainian drones, a fire was recorded in the area of the Marinovka military airfield in the Volgograd region.
The Defense Forces also attacked Bashkortostan. Bashkir Soda Company in Sterlitamak or Syntez-Kauchuk JSC could have been hit.
Mayor Emil Shaimardanov claimed air defenses downed all seven drones over the city. An earlier version of his post, quoted by Russian state news agency TASS, said eight.
“Debris fell on the territory of one of the enterprises. Minor damage was caused, the plant is operating normally,” Shaimardanov claimed.
He did not name the plant.
Smoke over the Bashkir Soda Company in Sterlitamak, with the plant marked on a satellite image, 29 October 2026. Collage: Supernova+
The Insider said NASA’s FIRMS fire map confirmed a fire at the plant. But the map shows only the weak heat source its satellites record there almost every night, the last time hours before the drones came, and nothing new after the attack.
Explore further
Russia’s refinery in Saratov, two in Tatarstan, a pumping station in Bashkortostan — one night’s oil target list
Moscow and other regions under attack
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin claimed that 613 drones flew toward the Moscow region overnight, that most were downed on the far approaches, and that 231 were downed on approach to the capital. Russia’s aviation agency restricted flights at Vnukovo, Domodedovo, and Zhukovsky airports. Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed it downed 1,214 drones over 19 regions overnight.
Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces hit a depot of Geran drones, Russia’s version of the Iranian Shahed, along with a drone launch site and a fuel depot near Navlya in Bryansk Oblast, about 70 km from the Ukrainian border. The Atesh partisan movement reported a loud explosion near Oryol’s airfield and a large fire in Lipetsk, about 285 km from the border.
Explosions in occupied Crimea, power cuts in occupied Luhansk
Subscribers of Crimean monitoring channel Krymsky Veter reported drones and then a strong explosion with Russian air defenses firing in Krasnoperekopsk, in occupied Crimea, about 95 km from the front line.
In occupied Luhansk, about 105 km from the front line, residents reported another attack on Lugacom, the occupation’s mobile operator, and internet outages followed, Exilenova+ said. The channel named only Lugacom. The operator sits in the seized Ukrtelecom building. Exilenova+ also posted footage of a fire in the city.
Leonid Pasechnik, the Russian-installed head of the occupied part of Luhansk Oblast, claimed that 150,000 customers in six municipalities lost power after attacks on energy facilities.
La ciudad de Dnipró, en el este de Ucrania, ha vivido este jueves una nueva tragedia. Al menos 13 personas han muerto y más de una decena han resultado heridas, incluido un niño de 11 años, por el impacto de un dron ruso propulsado a reacción en un andén de la estación de ferrocarril, según ha denunciado el jefe de la Administración Militar Regional ucrania, Oleksandr Ganzha. La explosión se ha producido cuando dos trenes estaban detenidos en las vías. Uno de ellos, un convoy de cercanías que cubría la ruta Dnipró–Zaporiyia, estaba en el andén alcanzado por el proyectil.
Equipos de rescate ucranios transportan a una persona herida en el ataque ruso a la estación de tren de Dnipró, en una imagen de los servicios de emergencia de Ucrania.
Russia has started installing magnetometers in the tails or tail fins of its Geran attack drones, Vladyslav Vlasiuk, the Ukrainian president’s commissioner for sanctions policy, said on Facebook on 28 October.
Russia uses its Shahed-Geran series drones in massive daily attacks on Ukraine. Ukrainian forces jam Gerans’ satellite navigation to push them off course, and Russia keeps hardening the drones against it, already fitting them with adaptive antennas. The magnetometer appears designed to go further, giving the drone a heading that doesn’t depend on satellites at all. Earlier this month, Ukrainian military intelligence reported a US-made magnetometer in the upgraded Geran-4.
A new jamming device, and Western parts at the core
Vlasiuk posted photos from a site where Ukraine studies Russian weapons and their components. He said he takes the findings for Ukraine’s sanctions work. He did not say which Geran models carry the magnetometer.
Ukrainian specialists study electronics from Russian weapons. Photo: Vladyslav Vlasiuk/Facebook
At the same time, Ukraine is studying how a new jamming device works. Vlasiuk did not say where it was found or what it targets.
“Western electronics are at the core everywhere,” Vlasiuk wrote.
Geran-4 already flew with a US-made sensor
On 5 October, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (HUR) said the upgraded Geran-4 carries a new “MOKh” unit built around a PNI5GA magnetometer made by US firm PNI Sensor. The unit works with the SADRA inertial navigation module to cut gyroscope drift and make the drone’s autonomous navigation more accurate.
HUR said Russia also added an electro-optical navigation system called Susanin to the upgraded Geran-4. It compares camera images with a reference image stored in memory to keep the drone on its route to the target. The new K5 version of the Geran-5 uses a similar system.
Presidential adviser Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov warned on 28 October that if Russia starts using Susanin en masse on Geran-5s and other drones and missiles at night, Ukraine may have to go back to switching off lights, especially on roads.
Geneva-based intelligence firm AURORAH Geosignal Intelligence on Tuesday accused Russia of using its satellite network to help Iran-backed militias in Yemen and Iraq attack targets in Saudi Arabia last month.
Login
