{"id":2980,"date":"2023-12-29T12:26:57","date_gmt":"2023-12-29T11:26:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpressgau.4lima.de\/?p=2980"},"modified":"2026-02-26T12:40:45","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T11:40:45","slug":"trench-cleaner-being-tested-in-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/2023\/12\/29\/trench-cleaner-being-tested-in-ukraine\/","title":{"rendered":"German \u201cTrench Cleaner\u201d being tested in Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Bavarian defence start-up Donaustahl GmbH<\/a> delivered humanitarian goods to Ukraine just four days after the start of the full-scale invasion and has been involved in the defence of Ukraine against the Russian armed forces for more than half a year now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After equipping the Ukrainian National Police with ODIN 2 pistol kits \u2014 a pistol carabiner platform, supplying field deployment kits for Starlink terminals to the Ukrainian army, providing Ukrainian combat medics with ampoule holders, and also testing 3D-printable surveillance UAVs for the AFU, the company is now stepping up its game once again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yesterday, Donaustahl published a series of photos of another development that is currently being tested on the front line. The so-called \u201cTrench Cleaner\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a UAV-assisted system for the cost-effective removal of booby traps in trenches. An important system, as the Russian army regularly rigged its trenches with booby traps to maximise damage to the AFU.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two of the four published photos show a Russian trench captured by the Ukrainian army somewhere on the front line. On the ground is a barely visible steel cable connecting several explosive devices \u2014 so-called IEDs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The drone, which was most likely carrying several so-called \u201cTrench Cleaner Grenades\u201d, dropped one of them into the trench. The steel cable connecting the IEDs was cut by the pinpoint explosion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the forces of a normal grenade explosion (without obstacles in the way) work relatively evenly in all directions, this does not seem to be the case with the \u201cTrench Cleaner Grenade\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further published photos of a test somewhere in the Kherson region show that the explosion spreads out in a star shape and thus concentrates the force of the explosion on certain areas.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Trench
Star-shaped explosion somewhere in the Kherson region<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The concentrated explosion appears to cut relatively deep paths into the ground, therefore cutting through wires and cables regardless of whether they are lying uncovered or hidden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u201cTrench Cleaner\u201d, made of steel, carbon and nylon, has a 360 degree effective range of 2.5 metres in diameter and can cut wires and cables at a height of up to 60 cm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Donaustahl invented this product in Germany, the assembly of the grenades and the handling of explosives and fuses are exclusively done in Ukraine, not in Germany.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, the \u201cTrench Cleaner\u201d is still under development, so I can’t publish all the information yet, but I hope that this will change soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In any case, this system is an interesting development that may well have a certain influence on the front line \u2014 depending on the number of systems which can be delivered and the effectiveness of the system in general. I am very curious to see what the future holds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

If you liked this post, consider following me on X<\/a>, Bluesky<\/a>, or Telegram<\/a>. If you like, you can also leave me a tip on Ko-fi<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Bavarian defence start-up Donaustahl GmbH has announced that a new development \u2014 the so-called Trench Cleaner \u2014 is currently being tested by the AFU. All details in the article.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900,299],"tags":[328,267,329,269],"class_list":{"0":"post-2980","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-german-defence-industry","8":"category-military-aid","9":"tag-donaustahl-gmbh","10":"tag-germany","11":"tag-trench-cleaner","12":"tag-ukraine"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8309,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2980\/revisions\/8309"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deaidua.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}