A drone (unmanned aerial vehicle) with explosives was on Friday shot down in Jammu’s Akhnoor Sector and the tying material used “resembles the ones found with the payloads dropped” on the technical airport at the Air Force Station (AFS)-Jammu on June 27 that left two Indian Air Force Personnel injured.
“There was a specific input that the Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) was planning to drop a payload by a drone near Akhnoor. Around 1 a.m., the police spotted the drone and shot it down. Around 5 kg of improvised explosive device (IED) material was attached to it,” Additional Director General of Police (ADGP), Jammu, Mukesh Singh, said.
The IED, the police said, was to be picked up by militants or their supporters on this side of the International Border (IB). The IED, which could be detonated by connecting a few wires, was attached to a wing of the hexacopter (having six wings). It was fitted with both a flight controller and a Global Positioning System.
The drone was more than six km inside the IB.
‘Assembled one’
“The drone is an assembled one, with its parts manufactured in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The threads recovered were the same as that of those used to drop the payloads at the Air Force Station, Jammu. It seems the JeM has assembled many drones with the same series. The serial number of the flight controller found on the drone on Friday is just one digit different from the one that was shot down at Akhnoor recently,” Mr. Singh said.
“The drones recovered in the recent past are being used to drop payloads, including AK-47 rifles and IED material. Such drones can travel up to 20 km, depending on the payload,” he noted.
Around 16 AK-47 rifles, three M-4 rifles, 34 pistols, 15 grenades, 18 IEDs and ₹4 lakh cash have been ferried using drones in the last one and a half years in Jammu, he added.
The police have put in place an anti-drone system at several installations in Jammu, including the airport.
Published - July 23, 2021 09:53 am IST
