The Turkish drone that changed how small countries fight. Live Bayraktar TB2 positions.
No Bayraktar TB2 is transmitting ADS-B at the moment.
Military aircraft are not obliged to broadcast, so this happens regularly. The count refreshes every thirty seconds.
Nothing of this type is up right now.
The TB2 is not a technically remarkable aircraft — a slow, propeller-driven drone carrying four small laser-guided munitions — and that is exactly the point. It costs a fraction of an American MQ-9, Turkey will sell it to almost anyone, and it turned out to be devastating against opponents without functioning air defences.
Its performance in Libya, Nagorno-Karabakh and the opening months of the war in Ukraine gave it a reputation that outran its actual capabilities, to the point where it acquired a folk song. Against a competent integrated air defence it is vulnerable, and losses have been heavy.
More than thirty countries have bought it. Turkish aircraft transmit occasionally; most operators do not.
Planespotters photograph aircraft at airports, and an unmanned aircraft flying from military strips never passes a camera. We would rather show nothing than a picture of a different aircraft.
It was cheap, widely exported and highly effective in conflicts where the opponent lacked working air defences — Libya, Nagorno-Karabakh and early Ukraine. Its reputation outran its capabilities somewhat, and losses have been substantial against better-defended opponents.
It is far smaller, slower and shorter-ranged, carrying about a tenth the payload. It also costs a small fraction as much, and Turkey exports it with far fewer restrictions than the United States applies to the Reaper.