cope

PERRIE Edwards has laid bare her former heartache over her “hellish” split with boyband singer Zayn Malik.

The Little Mix alum, who started dating the One Direction star in 2012, told of her “breakdowns” following their break-up in 2015.

The pair became engaged prior to calling time on their relationship, yet things ended badly, with Perrie, 32, claiming that Zayn broke up with her via text.

Rumours were also rife that he cheated on the Black Magic singer and the popstar, who now is a mum of two and set to wed fiance Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, has again hinted at infidelity and “overlap” in a new chat on podcast Great Company.

She bravely re-visited her “hellish” heartache in the chat with Made in Chelsea alum Jamie Laing and said of her split with Zayn: “When you go through heartbreak, it is hellish.

“It’s the worst thing in the world. You can’t eat. You can’t sleep. You feel horrendous.

wedding bells

Perrie Edwards finally reveals when she’ll marry Alex after 4 year engagement

PERRIE JOGS ON

Perrie Edwards dealt blow as she closes fashion brand amid mounting debts

“You feel abandoned and you don’t feel good enough and you feel like you’ve been left for something better or whatever it is.

“And then what makes it even worse is, I felt like the world was then looking at me, laughing at me.

‘Not my fans, my fans were like, ‘we love you, we’ll fight your corner no matter what.’ But I felt embarrassed. I felt horrified. It was awful”.

The Shout Out To My Ex hitmaker then told Jamie she didn’t stay sane in the aftermath of the split and had “serious breakdowns”.

She added: “It wasn’t just the heartbreak I was dealing with.

“I was dealing with everybody looking at me and I felt ridiculed. I just couldn’t cope with it.

“I hated it. I was breaking down in performances, which isn’t like me at all. I was breaking down. I was crying constantly. I think I was depressed.

“And I know it sounds ridiculous, but I think it was this plus, this plus, this and everything on top.

“I had to be there for the girls. I had to be switched on. I had to power through for Little Mix, but I also just wanted to be left the f**k alone. But I also was getting followed every two seconds and asked about it 24/7”.

In the lengthy chat she hinted at an “overlap” between Zayn and another of his lovers and admitted she “needed to be careful” how to phrase it.

She then referenced his music video for his debut solo single Pillowtalk, which featured supermodel Gigi Hadid, who would go on to be his girlfriend and the mother of his child.

Perrie said: “I need to be careful how I say this, but there was, let’s just say there was a bit of a… I’m just going to say it.

“So there was a bit of an overlap.

“I think when you’re moving on with somebody else you always get on better.

“When you’re the one left behind, that’s when it’s hard because it’s like, ‘Oh s**t, they’ve left me for someone more beautiful than me, someone better than me.’

‘Whatever it is, that’s how it felt at the time.

“And then you have a song that they’ve written about you, but then someone else is in the video.”

The Sun has gone to Zayn’s rep for comment.

Thankfully, Perrie’s love life is now firmly on the up.

The singer and footballer fiance Alex, both 32, announced their engagement four years ago and share children Axel, four, and Alanis, who was born in January.

Zayn and Gigi dated in 2015 and had an on-off relationship until 2021.

They share daughter Khai, who was born in 2020.

Forced to defend against thousands of Iranian drone and missile attacks before and after the ceasefire in the now-paused U.S.-Israel war on Iran, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) appears to have taken a play from Russia and its war with Ukraine in an attempt to secure some of its energy facilities with massive metal ‘cope cages.’

An image posted on X by Israel’s I24 News outlet shows what it claims is caging around oil tanks near Dubai International Airport. In the far-right section of the photo, what appears to be a more complete metal enclosure of some of the fuel tanks can be seen, while in the foreground, construction looks to be taking place on caging for additional tanks.

This seems to be the first sighting of these structures in the UAE and across the Gulf Arab nations. It is unclear when construction on the structures began or how many of these barriers the UAE is building or plans to build. We have reached out to the UAE Embassy in Washington for more details.

As we have reported in the past, the idea behind these kinds of metal structures is to mitigate the damage caused by incoming munitions by creating a barrier between the point of weapon impact and the target. The caging depicted is not designed to protect against Iranian ballistic missiles, and even cruise missiles could be a challenge. These kinds of structures are made to help defend against one-way attack munitions, such as the Shahed-136, many of which Iran has launched against the UAE. They can also protect from near-field small suicide drone attacks, although these have not been a major issue in the UAE during this conflict.

As noted earlier, while these structures may be new to the UAE, it is not the first time metal caging and even mesh nets have been used to protect critical energy infrastructure. Russia has employed these measures on its oil storage facilities in attempts to protect them from repeated Ukrainian drone attacks for a number of years now.

You can see some of those defensive measures in the following images and videos.

Russia Puts Cope Cages on Oil Storage Tanks

A recent development in the Black Sea drone war has seen a Russian Navy patrol boat appear with a screen, commonly known as a “cope cage,” on top of its superstructure to help protect against drones. Whether the modification is a one-off or part of a broader plan, it emphasizes the growing ubiquity of drone threats, a reality that the U.S. Navy is also increasingly having to contend with.

Two photos showing Russian Navy Project 21980 Grachonok class patrol boats underway in the Black Sea were published by Ukrainian defense adviser Serhii Sternenko. The photos were reportedly taken this month, but it’s not clear if they show the same vessel (in one photo, the Russian Navy flag is flying from a mast, and in the other, it is not).

This may well be the first instance of this kind of add-on protection, which is now routinely used by both sides of the conflict in Ukraine on tanks and other fighting vehicles, being installed on a surface vessel. However, as we reported in the past, a cope cage has also appeared on at least one Russian Navy ballistic missile submarine, the Tula.

The Project 21980 vessel is described by Russia as a multi-purpose anti-saboteur boat. Primarily designed to protect ports and other naval installations, they are used by the Russian Navy as well as the Border Service. Around 30 of the vessels have been completed since 2008.

According to Ukrainian sources, Russia’s Black Sea Fleet operates nine Project 21980 boats, while another four are assigned to the Border Service.

Displacing around 150 tons, the Project 21980 is a little over 100 feet long and can be armed with a 14.5 mm machine gun, anti-sabotage grenade launchers, and an Igla-series man-portable air defense system (MANPADS). Ironically, the Russian media has, in the past, heralded the success of the Grachonok class during exercises in which the vessel was used to detect and destroy uncrewed aerial vehicles (as well as uncrewed surface vessels and other small-sized surface targets).

The cope cage covers most of the surface area of the vessel, with three distinct levels: a first section protecting the area above the stern; a second section mounted above the bridge and projecting aft of it, but below the antenna array; and a third section aft of the main superstructure. The sides of the vessel appear entirely unprotected; this may well be to allow normal operations such as docking. Furthermore, access here is required to operate the weapons, as well as the rigid-hull inflatable boat (RHIB) that is typically stowed at the stern, and which is deployed and recovered by crane.

Considering the normal mounting of the machine gun on the bow and the grenade launchers firing aft from the rear of the superstructure, it’s not clear how these weapons function after the cope cage is fitted. At the very least, the additional protection screens would appear to significantly reduce their fields of fire, limiting them to a very depressed trajectory.

Moreover, while the cope cage provides a degree of overhead protection against drone-delivered munitions, it can be easily seen how a skilled drone operator would be able to find a gap in the protection. FPV drones, in particular, are highly maneuverable and have already demonstrated their ability to penetrate inside armored vehicles through open hatches and into buildings through whatever openings might be available. In this case, flying a drone around the static cope cages would not appear to be too difficult.

At the same time, the protection doesn’t address the threat posed by uncrewed surface vessels (USVs, ‘drone boats’) and uncrewed underwater vessels (UUVs) that have repeatedly been used to attack Russian targets in and around the Black Sea.

The threat of Ukrainian naval drones was most recently underscored in an incident on the night of April 30, when, according to reports, a Border Service PSKA-300 class patrol boat was struck, close to the Kerch Bridge. A photograph subsequently published on a Telegram channel showed a memorial plaque indicating that nine members of the Russian crew were killed in the strike. Ukrainian reports suggest that, as well as the PSKA-300, a Project 21980 Grachonok class patrol boat was also hit in the same raid.

🚨⚓ BREAKING: Ukrainian Navy struck Russian patrol boats guarding the Kerch Bridge overnight on April 30.

A Sobol patrol boat of the FSB Border Service and a Grachonok anti-sabotage boat were hit in the Kerch Strait area. https://t.co/dEFbWvQM8M pic.twitter.com/0Ib1M3rbyG

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) April 30, 2026

The PSKA-300 and Project 21980 are both regularly used to patrol the waters around the Kerch Bridge, linking mainland Russia with occupied Crimea, which is a regular target of Ukrainian strikes.

At the same time, equipping surface vessels with these kinds of add-on protection is a logical extension of the drone war. Russian forces began installing top protection on their tanks in the build-up to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Armor of this type has since become a common feature on Russian and Ukrainian tanks and other armored vehicles, primarily as a defense against FPV and other types of weaponized commercial drones.

As the war has progressed, the threat of Ukrainian aerial drones has been extended into the Black Sea.

Last summer, we reported on how Ukraine had begun using so-called bomber drones launched from USVs to attack targets in Crimea. The occupied peninsula is especially target-rich, hosting high-value Russian radar and air defense systems, as well as military aircraft. In that context, Ukraine using similar weapons to target Russian surface vessels in the Black Sea should come as no surprise.

Bomber drones launched from drone boats offer various advantages. They give Ukrainian operators the ability to strike more than one target per drone with heavier warheads than typical FPV drones usually carry. They can also travel farther while maintaining their connection, as they don’t have to dive to the ground to hit their targets. As we have reported in the past, Ukraine also has bomber drones that can launch guided munitions with a heavier punch. All of these would offer a significant threat to Russian vessels in the Black Sea.

Already, Ukrainian actions have effectively forced the Black Sea Fleet to vacate Crimea and instead operate from Novorossiysk, although this hasn’t removed the Ukrainian threat entirely.

As well as heavier and more capable bomber drones, Ukrainian drone boats are also increasingly being used as platforms for launching FPV drones. Back in 2024, the first evidence emerged that Ukraine was using a capability like this, with aerial drones being launched from USVs as part of its campaign of attacks on Russian offshore platforms. 

Meanwhile, it was reported recently that the HX-2 strike drone, from German manufacturer Helsing, has been adapted for launch from small boats. The company states that the HX-2s feature standoff range and artificial intelligence (AI) enabled capabilities that make them resistant to electronic warfare systems, and can be employed in networked swarms.

🇩🇪 German HX-2 strike drone, which is used by 🇺🇦Ukraine, has been adapted for deployment from boats, – Militarnyi

Helsing reported that it successfully conducted the first launch of the drone from a coastal vessel. pic.twitter.com/PAujJE2Wd5

— MAKS 25 🇺🇦👀 (@Maks_NAFO_FELLA) May 11, 2026

Further proliferation of FPV drones and new missions for these types include a growing emphasis on using them in a coastal defense capacity. Here, again, patrol boats like the Project 21980 would be exposed to additional threats.

Overall, questions remain about how effective the drone protection on the Project 21980 patrol boat might be in practice. However, the emergence of the fixture again underscores Russia’s concerns about the dangers posed by Ukrainian weaponized drones. This is a threat that is now very real across all domains and one that is steadily growing worldwide.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com