Iran's Qods Aviation Industries Yasir UAV made its first official appareance abroad this week at the 3rd edition of the Azerbaijan International Defence Exhibition, held from 25th to 27th September in Baku.
Qods Aviation Industries' Yasir UAV at ADEX 2018
(Picture source Army Recognition)
An unlicensed copy of the Insitu ScanEagle drone, the Yasir was unveiled in September 2013. The Yasir's only official state operator is Iran. It has reportedly been exported to at least one non-state actor and is alleged to have been exported to several more.
The Yasir has a single, unidentified, two-bladed propeller engine. This give it an endurance of about eight hours and an operational range of 100 km within a service ceiling of 10,000m. Recovery is provided by belly landing.
While being showcased without payload at ADEX 2018, it usually carries an electro-optical payload. The Yasir was modified compared to legacy ScanEagle by adding a twin-tailboom empennage and an inverted v-tail elerudder.
Pictures released by Iranian newspapers in 2013 confirmed that this modified ScanEagle is now being mass-produced.
"Yasir is designed as a reconnaissance and surveillance UAV system. The UAV can be based on shipboard or deployed on land to carry out different missions," said Qods Aviation Industry.
According to data released by Qods Aviation Industries, the Yasir has a wingspan of 3 m, a length of 2.1 m and a MTOW of 21 kg. It has maximum speed of 130 km/h.
