Forbes: Ukrainian “dragon drones” melt Russian “turtle tanks” with 3,000°C thermite charges

Ukrainian forces have found a fiery solution to counter Russia’s heavily armored “turtle tanks,” deploying thermite-carrying drones that can burn through layers of improvised protection, Forbes war correspondent David Axe reports.

These Russian vehicles, dubbed “turtle tanks” for their extensive DIY armor additions, including sheet metal, grills, and even logs, have proven resilient against conventional explosive drones.

“All that extra protection might make the up-armored vehicles slow and difficult to steer, but it can also blunt the effect of the explosive first-person-view drones that are everywhere all the time along the 800-mile front line,” Axe says.

The latest countermeasure employs what Ukrainian forces call “dragon drones,” capable of delivering thermite charges that burn at temperatures reaching 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,760 degrees Celcius). According to a 2000 US Army study, soldiers targeted by thermite have just 10 seconds to escape before risking fatal burns.

The effectiveness of these incendiary drones was recently demonstrated by Ukraine’s Phoenix drone group near Kostyantynivka in Donetsk Oblast.