Illustrative image, source: the Houthis media wing.
On January 30, the Houthis (Ansar Allah) announced that they had shot down a US-made Boeing Insitu ScanEagle drone over the central Yemeni province of Ma’rib.
In a statement, Brig. Gen. Yahya Sari, a spokesman for the Yemeni group, said that the drone was shot down with a “suitable weapon” over the district of al-Jubah.
The drone was of the ScanEagle 2 variant which has a top speed of 148 kilometers and an endurance of more than 16 hours. The ScanEagle 2 mainly used for reconnaissance missions. It is equipped with a day and night capable sensor, a fully digital video system and an advanced navigation system.
This was the first ScanEagle drone to be shot down by the Houthis in 2022. Last year, the group shot down a total of eight drones of this type over Ma’rib.
A few hours after shooting down the drone, the Houthis announced that they had targeted a large gathering of the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Giants Brigades in the district of Usaylan in the Yemeni province of Shabwah with a ballistic missile.
“The targeting resulted in the death and injury of large numbers of them [UAE-backed fighters], and the destruction and burning of five vehicles,” Brig. Gen. Sari said in a statement.
Yemeni news sources claimed that the Houthis’ missile struck a market in the town of al-Nukub, wounding a number of people.
This was the Houthis’ third missile strike on Saudi-led coalition proxies in less than a week. On January 26, a ballistic missile launched by the group hit the provincial capital of Ma’rib. On January 28, the group targeted a large gathering of UAE-backed forces in Usaylan with a ballistic missile.
The Houthis’ recent strikes are meant to deter the Saudi-led coalition and its proxies who escalated their ground operations in central Yemen in the last few weeks.
