Sea drone Magura-7 brings down Russian Su-30SM Flanker

Russia's war against Ukraine, now in its fourth year, has already produced many innovations and surprises. Now comes the next first: a Ukrainian sea drone has shot down a Russian supersonic combat aircraft.

The special unit “Group 13” of Ukraine's defence intelligence steered a Magura-7 naval drone to within about 50 kilometres of the port of Novorossiysk, where the remnants of the Russian Black Sea Fleet are anchored. The unmanned surface vessel (USV) must have covered at least 700 kilometres to do so.

The Magura-7 was developed as a variant of the Magura-5, which, with its explosive charge, had successfully attacked ships such as the frigate “Ivanovets”. The Magura-7 instead carries infrared-guided missiles capable of shooting down aircraft.

Ukraine has been working on this specific capability for more than a year. Several failures were followed by the first success on 31 December 2024: two Mi-8 helicopters were shot down.

On 3 May it was a fighter jet's turn: a Sukhoi Su-30SM of Russian naval aviation (NATO designation: Flanker-H). According to Russian sources, the aircraft was stationed with the Black Sea Fleet's 43rd Assault Aviation Regiment in occupied Saky in Crimea.

Sea drones now also threaten air superiority

The Russian Black Sea Fleet has largely had to cede control of the sea to Ukrainian surface drones. Now it also faces losing air superiority.

According to the Russian Telegram channel “fighterbomber”, Ukraine now operates more than three dozen USV in the Novorossiysk area. Guided or self-guided weapons that could reliably hit such small and agile targets do not exist anywhere in the world, the channel says. Russian aircraft therefore try to engage the drone boats visually with onboard weapons.

From a Russian perspective, that may be true. Russia usually compensates for a lack of precision with much larger warheads – an approach that fails against small, manoeuvrable targets. NATO, by contrast, already has sea- and air-launched weapons against asymmetric surface targets in service, with systems such as RIM-116 or Hellfire.

Initially, both Ukrainian and Russian sources assumed that a Soviet-made R-73 missile had been used. The “fighterbomber” channel, by contrast, speaks of MANPADS on board the USV.

Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov, head of Ukraine's defence intelligence, named a different weapon speaking to “The War Zone”: the USV had fired an AIM-9M Sidewinder missile. Budanov told TWZ: “We use several types of missiles on our Magura-7, but we achieve the best results with the AIM-9”.

The Russian Telegram channel “voenkorKotenok” (war correspondent Kitten) draws three sobering conclusions:

• In the waters of the Black Sea, the initiative lies with the enemy (Ukraine).
• Militarily, the Black Sea Fleet has still not recovered from the loss of its flagship “Moskva” and other ships. What remains of it is withdrawing into ports and bays.
• In unmanned boats (USV), the enemy (Ukraine) has an overwhelming lead: it can strike in any part of the sea area and control both the coast of the Russian Federation and the adjacent airspace.

Kitten also writes: “Russia needs new victories so that its ‘allies’ do not cancel their participation in parades for health reasons in future.”

The channel is alluding to the fact that several invited state guests cancelled their participation in the 9 May celebrations on Red Square at short notice – presumably also for fear of Ukrainian drone attacks.