MOSCOW, October 6. /TASS/. The Russian Gortenzia FPV (First Person View) kamikaze drone has received a thermal imager for night combat missions in the zone of the special military operation in Ukraine, the drone’s developer told TASS on Friday.

"The Gortenzia drones were engineered by specialists of the eponymous design bureau. Currently, we are carrying out work on expanding the family of Gortenzia FPV drones. Other types of unmanned aerial vehicles are also in the focus of our attention. In addition, we constantly fine-tune the Gortenzia control system and various extra modules for the drone to boost its capabilities. For example, we have now created a drone with a thermal imager, which means that it can carry out missions in the zone of the special military operation at night," the Gortenzia design bureau said.

The Gortenzia drone is a mass-produced UAV and can be employed to ferret out targets, drop cargoes and operate as a kamikaze vehicle, it specified.

"Over 2,500 Gortenzia UAVs have been supplied to the zone of the special military operation since 2022. This is a very large amount of deliveries. Russian service members sometimes send video materials with missions accomplished. Over this month alone, they have sent us 20 records of sorties. We do not maintain specific statistics on enemy targets destroyed and damaged as our business is to produce and supply them [drones]," the design bureau said.

The maximum payload is 2 kg for the Gortenzia 7 (7 inches) and 3-3.5 kg for the Gortenzia 9 (9 inches) models. The UAV has flight duration of 6-8 minutes with a payload and 30 minutes without it and can effectively strike targets within 7 km. This range is extended, if a Gortenzia R rebroadcasting transmitter is employed.