The Ukrainian Defense Forces have intercepted Merlin-VR, the latest Russian reconnaissance drone.

A video of the enemy drone’s interception was published on the National Guard of Ukraine’s official Telegram page.

Soldiers of the 4th Operational Brigade of the National Guard of Ukraine intercepted the drone in the Lyman-Kupiansk sector.

The Rubizh Brigade’s Anti-Aircraft Missile and Artillery Division was directly involved in intercepting the Russian reconnaissance drone.

The enemy reconnaissance drone was intercepted by a specially prepared FPV drone designed to destroy aerial targets.

The drone was hit at the coordinates 48.804864, 38.042564, near the village of Zvanivka, Bakhmut district, Donetsk region.

It should be noted that this is not the first case of interception of the Merlin-VR reconnaissance drone, presented by the Russian Research Institute of Modern Telecommunication Technologies in 2021.

In June 2022, the Ukrainian Defense Forces intercepted a Russian Merlin, which was the first documented case of interception of this type of drone.

The Merlin-VR is equipped with a hybrid propulsion system, which should provide it with low acoustic visibility.

Little is known about the drone’s technical characteristics. It can stay in the air for up to ten hours and rise to an altitude of 5 km. The payload is 6.5 kilograms, which allows the UAV to be equipped with a powerful optoelectronic module.

The drone is being manufactured at the facilities of a Russian institute in Smolensk.

Militarnyi previously reported that during the repulsion of a night attack by a Shahed-136, a Ukrainian MiG-29 pilot shot down two enemy UAVs using air-to-air missiles.