Unsettling ‘jellyfish’ drones spotted by downed US fighter pilot hints Iran is beefing up war tech: expert

Chris Nesi / NEW YORK POST

The unsettling swarm of drones that a downed US pilot in Iran said moved in a bizarre “jellyfish-like” formation indicates the Iranian regime has devoted significant resources to beefing up its drone program — so it can counter the conventional battlefield tech of its rivals.

“They are adapting faster than us,” Brett Velicovich, drone expert and founder of Powerus, told The Post.

“Iran has spent years developing capabilities designed to offset the overwhelmingly conventional advantages of the United States and its allies.” 

The unnamed F-15 pilot, who was rescued April 3 after hiding deep in enemy territory in the Zagros Mountains for more than a day, described a “minefield of drones” hovering in the air — which he surmised could have helped Iran shoot his plane down.

Velicovich said it was possible the injured pilot — who was badly concussed — might not have been seeing straight when he observed the swarm, but said what he saw could have been a so-called “mothership” drone.

Motherships, Velicovich said, are large drone aircraft capable of relaying communications or orders to other drones connected to them. Motherships are “a relatively normal way of warfare” in battle zones like Ukraine, he added.

The mothership goes way up in the air to provide an overview, sometimes connected to a tether, “then if it sees something out of the ordinary, it’ll drop a smaller drone like a [First-Person View drone] to conduct strikes” or surveillance drones to get the lay of the land.

Smaller drones can also be strung together using technology like Starlink or a mesh network, which Velicovich said Iran has the capabilities to do, and are commonplace on the battlefield in other war zones currently raging around the world.

“Right now, if you were to go to Ukraine and Russia, they use these mothership drones to extend the distance that a smaller drone is able to fly,” he said.

“Hypothetically, these drones could have been going up very high in the air to gain situational awareness, especially if US forces were in the area. It’s definitely within the art of the possible that this is something the Iranians have.” 

Despite being something “many other countries have” in their arsenal, he said the technology on display as relayed by the downed airman was a “cutting edge piece of technology” typically only wielded by countries at war.

Velicovich said what worries him personally is the “unpredictability” of these drone capabilities, “not only from Iran, but other hostile nations like China and Russia,” whose drone programs are all outpacing those in the US.

“The areas that concern military planners most are not necessarily traditional tanks or fighter jets, but rather drones, ballistic and cruise missiles, electronic warfare, cyber operations and increasingly sophisticated command-and-control networks,” he said. See photos here.