Yasir (UAV)

Yasir
Role	Unmanned aerial vehicle
National origin	United States
Manufacturer	IAIO
First flight	September 2013[1]
Status	Active
Primary users	Iran Hezbollah (alleged) Harakat Hizbullah Al Nujaba' (Iraq) (alleged)
Developed from	Boeing Insitu ScanEagle (unlicensed)

Yasir or Yassir (Persian: یاسر‎‎) is a small, low-cost, long-endurance Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) built by Iran Aviation Industries Organization (IAIO) and unveiled on 28 September 2013.^[2] It is capable of flying at an altitude of 15,000 ft, has an endurance of 8 hours, and an operational radius of 200 km^[3] It is an unlicensed copy of the American ScanEagle drone.

Operational history

Iranian capture and reverse engineering claims

In December 2012, Iran stated it had captured an American ScanEagle that allegedly violated its airspace over the Persian Gulf.^[4][5][6][7] The U.S. Navy stated that none of its ScanEagles were missing.^[8][9][10] On 17 December 2012, Iran announced it was starting mass production for a copy of the ScanEagle and has put that UAV into service. Iran later released images of this production line.^{[11][12][13][14]}

Gift to Russia

In October 2013, during a five-day visit to Iran by Russian Air Force Commander Lieutenant General Viktor Bondarev, Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps presented him with a copy of the US ScanEagle drone as a gift.^[15][16]

Alleged use by Hezbollah

In early 2014 and following the repetitive flying of an unidentified UAV over the Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea's Ma'arab complex, MP Antoine Zahra accused Hezbollah of flying a Yasir UAV in order to monitor and possibly assassinate Geagea.

Iraq

Iran has reportedly supplied Yasir UAVs to the Iraqi Shia militia Harakat Hizballah al-Nujaba (HHN).^[17][18]

Syrian Civil War

In December 2013, Al-Jazeera reported that Al-Qaeda had shot down an Iranian ScanEagle drone while it was flying over Aleppo.^[19]

Operators

•  Iran: IRGC Navy, IRGC Naval Special Operations Forces

See also

• Iran–U.S. RQ-170 incident - An earlier and similar incident of an American UAV captured by Iran.

References