The French Navy shot down a drone for the first time with an electronic warfare system

For the first time, the French Navy shot down an unmanned aerial vehicle in combat using an electronic warfare system.

This is reported by Naval news.

A French frigate shot down an aircraft-type drone using an electronic warfare system during a patrol in the Red Sea this October

This information was confirmed to journalists by two officers of the country's naval forces at the Euronaval 2024 exhibition:

«We were able to destroy the UAV with the brand new system we trained with during the Wildfire exercise. This system was good enough to be quickly integrated into the ship, after which he left with it to carry out the mission», – said Rear Admiral David Defugere.

We are talking about a device for jamming satellite navigation systems Neptune, as well as a system for suppressing radio frequencies of drones  MAJES DFB6. Their developer is the French company MC2 technology.

It is known that these systems are currently equipped with two French frigates, one of which is the Lorraine (D657) of the Aquitaine type. The latter with the corresponding systems was photographed in September this year by spotter Gilbert Gyssel.

The publication notes that this achievement is significant for the mentioned electronic warfare systems, since they were first used on a sea platform in combat conditions and were not intended for this.

The decision to install them on a ship that will go on combat duty was made after successful tests that took place during the Wildfire military exercises in September. Then they were able to neutralize a group of five drones at a distance of 15-30 kilometers.

The introduction of such systems into the combat component of the country's Navy will allow saving ammunition on ships, which is important during long sorties and duty in regions with a high threat of UAV and missile strikes.

Let us recall that during the Red Sea patrol operation, French Navy ships were repeatedly attacked. In particular, in August of this year, the missile destroyer Forbin intercepted a surface drone using shipboard artillery.

And in March of this year, the missile frigate Alsace intercepted three anti-ship ballistic missiles launched by the Houthis from Yemen in the Red Sea.