Russians Build Dozens of Shelters for Geran Drones at Airfield in Crimea – Satellite Images

Satellite images show Russia building over 20 reinforced shelters and around 40 garages for Geran attack drones at Hvardiiske airfield in occupied Crimea, despite previous Ukrainian strikes.

Infrastructure for storing Geran-type attack drones is being expanded at the Hvardiiske airfield in occupied Crimea. Oboronka reported this, citing OSINT analyst Dnipro Osint (Harbuz), who published satellite images of the site.

“New satellite images show the construction of more than 20 small shelters protected by earthen berms, as well as around 40 smaller ‘garages’ intended for storing, servicing, and preparing drones for launch,” the report said.

According to the analyst, the airfield also shows signs of previous Ukrainian attacks. In particular, at least one hangar has sustained damage that the analyst attributes to a drone strike.

In the published satellite images, the analyst marked the new drone storage facilities and highlighted an area of the airfield where signs of damage to one of the hangars were identified.

“One of the distinctive features of Hvardiiske airfield is the use of mobile launch platforms instead of fixed installations. The drones are loaded onto specially equipped vehicles, which are then used to launch them from the runway,” Dnipro Osint added.

Earlier, Oboronka reported that on September 1, Ukraine’s General Staff announced a strike on a site used for storing, preparing, and launching attack drones in Hvardiiske. Ukrainian forces attacked a similar facility on August 17.

On August 10, satellite images showed damage to hangars used for Geran drones following Ukrainian attacks. On July 3, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) reported striking two hangars containing Shahed drones and aviation equipment at the airfield.