Iran’s Hadid 110 drone has had an upgrade. Now, it flies lower, faster and is harder to see.

Jet-powered, with a top speed of more than 300mph, the new stealth drone has been built to slip through American air defences.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it had been deployed for the first time in the past fortnight, fired towards US bases and warships in the region.

The Telegraph understands that the drone is an advanced version of their standard Hadid 110, a weapon Iranian officials consider one of their most capable.

The suicide drone was first shown to Ali Khamenei last year, before the then ayatollah was killed in the war’s opening strikes.

What distinguishes the new Hadid 110 is speed and stealth.

Where most of Iran’s attack drones are propeller-driven and slow, this one carries a turbojet engine that Iranian sources say pushes it to 316mph, making it the fastest-known Iranian drone.

It is launched by a solid-fuel booster that lifts it to speed and altitude before the jet ignites, allowing rapid deployment from the field.

The speed offers it a huge battlefield advantage.

Air defences work by detecting an incoming threat, tracking it and firing an interceptor in time to meet it. The faster the target, the less time the defender has to complete that chain.

The new Hadid 110 is designed to shrink that window and reach its target before the guns and missiles guarding it can react.

Its shape is designed to hide it from radar as Iranian experts describe it as having a seamless, boltless airframe.

The S-shaped air intake mounted on top of the fuselage conceals the engine’s fan blades, while radar-absorbing material coats the outside.

The Hadid 110 carries a warhead weighing 30kg, or just under 5st, has a strike range of roughly 220 miles and can stay aloft for about an hour. That is enough to destroy important targets relatively close to Iran’s coast, but it is not a long-range strategic weapon.

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