Chinese 4X4 Capable of Launching “Suicide Drones”

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Military technology, much like any other technology, is always evolving and developing further. By building on past inventions, engineers all over the world manage to take existing technology and redefine it into a totally new purpose. That is exactly what a Chinese firm managed to do with its 4X4 drone launching truck.

At first glance the truck looks like a regular military truck with rocket launchers mounted on the back, but in reality the truck is equipped with 12 tubes each capable of launching an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle .

Developed by Yanjing Auto, the off road 4X4 is capable of reaching speeds of 77 miles per hour. Although the truck itself is probably the least impressive part of the system, the real point of interest in this system is the tubes fitted on the 4X4’s back.

Eight of the tubes on the back of the truck hold SULA89 drones, which carry over 4 pounds of explosives and are intended to crash into targets at speeds of over 110 miles per hour. The remaining four tubes hold smaller SULA30 drones, which are used for surveillance, relaying information back to the operators at the command center. The SULA30 drones have a flight time of over an hour.

When it comes to the larger “suicide drones”, it is unclear if the targets are marked by humans or if the drone decides the targets for itself. It seems most likely that human control would be limited to target selection before firing, letting the drone do the rest autonomously.

C4isrnet.com mentions that the Chinese firm has a variant of the truck that can field multiple armed hexacopter scout drones and another variant that can field an array of missiles. American firms are also developing drone launching vehicles, but that isn’t stopping Yanjing Auto from exporting the vehicle.