Meet the underground squad with the lives of countless civilians in their hands

“Follow me and be careful,” says the commander, as he leads us down a narrow path in the dead of night.

The overgrown tract had once been occupied by the Russians, and there are landmines scattered on the side of the path.

But the men with us are more concerned about the threat from above.

Members of a unit in Ukraine’s 3rd Assault Brigade, they run a covert operation from an underground cellar, tucked behind a ruined farmhouse.

And what they are doing in this old vegetable store is pushing the boundaries of war.

“This is the interceptor called Sting,” says the commander, named Betsik, holding up a cylindrical device with four propellers.

“It’s an FPV [first-person view] quad, it’s very fast, it can go up to 280km. There’s 600 grams of explosive packed in the cap.”

However, he had not told us the most important thing about this bulbous drone.

“It can easily destroy a Shahed,” he says with determination.

Devastating and indiscriminate drone attacks

Once viewed as a low-cost curiosity, the Iranian-designed Shahed drone has turned into a collective menace.

As Russia’s principal long-range attack weapon, enemy forces have fired 44,228 Shaheds into Ukraine this year, with production expected to rise to 6,000 per month by early next year.

The Russians are also changing the way they use them, launching vast, coordinated waves at individual cities.

The damage can be devastating and indiscriminate. This year, more 460 civilians have been killed by these so-called kamikaze weapons.

Russia’s strategy is straightforward. By firing hundreds of Shaheds on a single night, they aim to overload Ukraine’s air defences.

It is something Betsik reluctantly accepts.

Still, his unit has come up with a groundbreaking way to tackle it.

Perched in the centre of the vegetable store, we watch a youthful drone pilot and a couple of navigators staring at a bank of screens.

“Guys, there’s a Shahed 10km away from us. Can we fly there?” asks one of the navigators, called Kombucha.

He had just spotted a Shahed on the radar, but the enemy projectile was just out of reach.

“Well, actually 18 km – it’s too far,” Kombucha says.

“Do you know where it is going?” I ask.

“Yes, Izyum, the city. Flying over Izyum, I hope it won’t hit the city itself.”

Kombucha takes a deep breath.

“It is driving me nuts when you can see it moving, but you can’t do anything about it.”

The chase

The atmosphere soon changes.

“Let’s go. Help me lift the antenna.”

An engineer runs an interceptor drone up to the unit’s ad-hoc launch pad, located on a pile of flattened brick.

“The bomb is armed.”

The drone pilot, called Ptaha, tightens his grip on the controller and launches the Sting into the night sky.

Now, they hunt the Shahed down.

Their radar screen gives them an idea of where to look – but not a precise location.

“Target dropped altitude.”

“How much?”

“360 metres. You’re at 700.”

“Zoom out. Zoom out,” mutters Ptaha.

Then, a navigator code-named Magic thrusts his arm at the right-hand corner of the screen.

“There, there, there, b****!”

“I see it,” replies Ptaha.

The pilot manoeuvres the interceptor behind the Russian drone and works to decrease the distance between the two.

The chase is on. We watch as he steers the interceptor into the back of Shahed.

“We hit it,” he shouts.

“Did you detonate?”

“That was a Shahed, that was a Shahed, not a Gerbera.”

Going in for the kill

The Russians have developed a family of drones based on the Shahed, including a decoy called the Gerbera, which is designed to overwhelm Ukrainian defences.

However, the 3rd Brigade tells us these Gerberas are now routinely packed with explosives.

“I can see you’ve developed a particular technique to take them all down,” I suggest to Ptaha. “You circle around and try to catch them from behind?”

“Yes, because if you fly towards it head-on, due to the fact that the speed of the Shahed…”

The pilot breaks off.

“Guys, target 204 here.”

It’s clear that a major Russian bombardment is under way.

“About five to six km,” shouts Magic.

With another target to chase, the unit fires an interceptor into the sky.

Ptaha stares at the interceptor’s thermal camera screen.

The lives of countless Ukrainians depend on this 21-year-old.

“There, I see it. I see it. I see it.”

The team pursues their target before Ptaha goes in for the kill.

“There’s going to be a boom!” says Magic excitedly.

“Closing in.”

On the monitor, the live feed from the drone is replaced by a sea of fuzzy grey.

“Hit confirmed.”

“Motherf*****!”

‘In a few months it will be possible to destroy most of them’

The Russians would launch more than 500 drones that night.

Betsik and his men destroyed five with their Sting interceptors and the commander seemed thrilled with the result.

“I’d rate it five out of five. Nice. Five launches, five targets destroyed. One hundred percent efficiency. I like that.”

Nevertheless, 71 long-range projectiles managed to slip through Ukraine’s air defences, despite efforts made to stop them.

The head of the air defence section in 3rd Brigade, Maxim Zaychenko, told us lessons were being learnt in this underground cellar that would have to be shared with the entire Ukrainian army.

“As the number of Shaheds has increased we’ve set ourselves the task of forming combat crews and acquiring the capabilities to intercept them… it’s a question of scaling combat crews with the right personnel and equipment along the whole contact line.”

Buoyed by the night’s successes, Betsik was optimistic.

“In a few months, like three to five, it will be possible to destroy most of them,” he said.

“You really think that?” I replied.

“This is the future, I am not dreaming about it, I know it will be.”

Photography by Katy Scholes.