Russia Equips Low-Cost Gerbera Decoy Drones With Explosives for Nighttime Attacks

Russian forces have begun equipping ‘Gerbera’ decoy drones with explosive warheads, deploying them in nighttime attacks alongside Shahed-136 drones.

This was reported by Serhii Flesh, a military expert specializing in radio technology.

“In the white, polystyrene air defense ‘decoys’ known as Gerbera, we are now seeing various types of warheads, ranging from 3 to 5 kg of explosives,” Flesh stated.

A newly released photo shows one such drone equipped with a Russian OFBCh-2.5 fragmentation-explosive warhead, filled with OKFOL, a high-explosive compound.

This warhead is specifically designed for drones and is used in Russia’s Kub-BLA tactical strike UAVs, featuring an electromechanical impact fuse.

The Gerbera drone was first spotted in July last year during a massive drone attack on Kyiv region. It is designed to mimic Shahed-136/Geran-2 drones and is widely used by Russian forces to overload Ukraine’s air defense systems.

Due to its role as a decoy, the Gerbera drone features a simplified structure made from basic materials, allowing for maximum cost reduction. According to Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence, these drones are dozens of times cheaper than Shahed-136 strike drones.

Structurally, the drone consists of a plywood-and-polystyrene fuselage, a small engine, a rudimentary onboard computer, and a soft polyethylene fuel tank.

Previously, it was reported that Russia has begun using Shahed drones equipped with larger 90 kg warheads and shrapnel-filled payloads designed to inflict higher civilian casualties, according to Andrii Yermak, head of Ukraine’s Presidential Office, on January 30.