Since at least February, the Syrian government has been using Iranian-built UAS to track and target Free Syrian Army rebels in their strongholds, including Homs and Hamah. Now some fresh commercial satellite imagery provides new details about the unmanned aircraft’s possible tactics and capabilities. Based on the imagery, acquired by George Kaplan for his blog Open-Source Geo-Intelligence, the small unarmed, propeller-driven Mohajer 4 is apparently limited in range. The Mohajer 4 most likely relies on control signals radioed from its launch base, unlike some Western ‘bots which can be controlled via satellite from facilities pretty much anywhere in the world. The Syrian UAS ability to transmit video is probably equally constrained.
Damascus does not possess a global satellite communications network, so its UAS are likely controlled via line-of-sight radio. Assuming a 100-foot-tall radio antenna and a UAS flying at an altitude of 300 feet, the useful range of the Mohajer 4 is probably no more than 40 miles.
Indeed, Kaplan’s latest GeoEye satellite imagery shows the Mohajer 4s operating from Shayrat, a jet base just 18 miles from Hamah. “This … may suggest a shorter operational range for the pahpad than initially thought,” Kaplan wrote.
Syria’s rudimentary communications network also argues for a simple, point-to-point imagery transfer from drone to ground station. In other words, a Mohajer 4 probably beams back video directly, and solely, to the ground station from which the UAS is also launched and steered. Kaplan’s images from Shayrat depict what is apparently the Mohajer 4s’ control station, a shed-like facility with some kind of vehicle attached.
