Hello everybody! A ‘telegraphic‘ update for this evening. Yes, yes, this evening, the PSU has shot down another Russian A-50 AEW-aircraft (for my reconstruction of the shoot-down of the first one, back in January, please see here). This time it didn’t use any Patriots: the range was much too long. Instead, it was using one of ancient S-200 surface-to-air missile systems (ASCC/NATO reporting name was ‘SA-5 Gammon’). The jet was hit over the Krasnodar area, some 220km from the nearest point on the frontline held by the ZSU: the S-200 has a range of about 250km.
UK intelligence reports that they believe Russia has only five operational A50s vs six or seven from other sources.
Also reading reports that losing skilled experienced A50 crews may be a bigger problem for Russia than losing the actual aircraft, no idea if that is true.
Hi Tom, any explanation how Ukrainians could use the S-200 so far away? I mean it has the range to do so, but the horizon would hide the target completely since A-50 was below 1000m judging by the video.
Mind that A-50s are operating quite high. At around 8,000 metres. AFAIK, there is no problem to detect something flying above 6,000 metres altitude over the 200+ km range.
Moreover, they're emitting lots of electromagnetic emissions, and are thus easy to detect and track by passive means, too - like triangulation of radar missions with help of electronic warfare systems.
....and then there is a version of the S-200 missile with active radar seeker head. Means: one fires it in direction of the target, and then lets the missile activate its own seeker head and find its target.
Surely AWACS crews would be trained to stop emitting when they suspect a long range anti radiation missile's coming at them. Same incompetence as the losing of the Moskva, or maybe the Ukrainians rigged up something special....
I doubt the missile hit a flare - the thing had to actually flare there to work this way, and it's a still dark area on the video before the blast. So I'd say it was either a 1st missile had left not enough kinetic energy to catch the plane and so self-destructed, or it was another plane there - smaller and further and without flares, or the 1st blast was from an AD missile that tried to intercept the 2nd one (we have another video with a launch towards the plane, it's either a Russian friendly fire or a try to defend the plane by killing an S-200 missile).
I love how the platform that is supposed to track incoming weapons for S-300 and S-400 to knock down manages to get fragged by something that gets intercepted all the time by orc air defense.
Two down, what, six more to go? Just wait until someone develops an air-to-air drone that can fire off a Meteor or AIM-120D...
Thank you for the update Tom. I always suspected an S-200 would be involved with some of these really long range shoot downs. Its great to see Ukrainian news sources now confirm this. Surely its till not fully confirmed from the Ukrainian military but it makes sense. Also hearing theories about F16s, seem far fetched but interesting.
Thank you again Tom, nice try on the orcs renaming I'll stick with the tried and true name, sounds to me like things are really heating up and the orcs are giving it their all for Putans big election
Tom, do you expect any impact on the number of sorties the Russians can conduct after the loss of this airplane or more accurately if the Krasnodar-Azov sea becomes a no-flying zone for A50s.
In Ukraine they have not been called that for a long time. If I write how, the LGBT community will ban me. Tom, have you thought about adding payment for the armed forces of Ukraine to your articles, or is this prohibited here? For example, boats for the Marine Corps are now being assembled from Magyar. Thanks for your work. You are read in Kharkov.
Back in early 2022, there was a video with some actual orcs asking to stop comparing russians to them. :) I think they had a point: russian modus operandi (love for "meat wave attacks" + corruption of everything they touch up to the very ground) is more akin to the Zerg.
There's a Telegram channel I follow that while having an anti Putin stance, claims to have sources in both Ukrainian and Russian forces. In their post on the subject, their source in ZSU said that a couple of key positions within the plant were abandoned without authorization under heavy aerial bombardment. Russians quickly took those positions, Ukrainians were unable to take them back, and without them, it wasn't viable to hold the coke plant complex. They had to organize a hasty retreat abandoning a lot of ammunition and provisions. No more details were given.
Tom, what do you think the remaining few A-50 would be of great use to Russian troops? According to the last report of Mashovets in "Tverezo info" all Russian fleet is relocated to Novorossiysk except 2 ships that are repaired in Sevastopol.
Yes, i`m so happy that i was right and guessed correctly that RF will continue to push west of Adviidvka. They seems also they taken Severne. As of today they are also claiming they took Opitne and Lastochyne, i hope it`s wrong. There are also claims 2 of the abrams are also taken out. If that information is true, it will prove Ukraine did not manage to build good enough positions.
The US has the most powerful air force on the planet, more powerful than the next several countries combined. Generally, if you want a longer range, you make the rocket bigger. If the US do not have such SAM missiles, and I don't know if that's the case, it means they don't consider them useful. Army is a system.
I don't know why, but USAF doesn't have a long range missile like the legendary AIM-54C Phoenix of USN or the MBDA Meteor.
They seem to be happy with the AMRAAM (which is a medium range missile), because I guess that they depend on ground- and ship-based long distance missiles for this function?
I agree it's strange and I have no clue why. I doubt they rely on any ground or sea launchers as by design, their air force operates far away from any such systems. It's said that USAF fights its own war.
However, they are currently working on long range AA missiles and Meteor is going to be integrated with F-35. Therefore, I think we can now assume the US have fixed that disadvantage.
Also Ukraine just shot down one more A-50 approximately with IL-22 and another Su-34.
Yup. In my usual rush, almost forgot to add that. Is now included in the update, too.
UK intelligence reports that they believe Russia has only five operational A50s vs six or seven from other sources.
Also reading reports that losing skilled experienced A50 crews may be a bigger problem for Russia than losing the actual aircraft, no idea if that is true.
Thanks Tom . .
Hi Tom, any explanation how Ukrainians could use the S-200 so far away? I mean it has the range to do so, but the horizon would hide the target completely since A-50 was below 1000m judging by the video.
Mind that A-50s are operating quite high. At around 8,000 metres. AFAIK, there is no problem to detect something flying above 6,000 metres altitude over the 200+ km range.
Moreover, they're emitting lots of electromagnetic emissions, and are thus easy to detect and track by passive means, too - like triangulation of radar missions with help of electronic warfare systems.
....and then there is a version of the S-200 missile with active radar seeker head. Means: one fires it in direction of the target, and then lets the missile activate its own seeker head and find its target.
Ahh, ok thought there are only semi active and the track was lost when they went below the horizon. Thanks
Surely AWACS crews would be trained to stop emitting when they suspect a long range anti radiation missile's coming at them. Same incompetence as the losing of the Moskva, or maybe the Ukrainians rigged up something special....
The A50 is said to have fired heat traps and one of the missiles hit a trap. Thus they seem to have used heat guidance.
I doubt the missile hit a flare - the thing had to actually flare there to work this way, and it's a still dark area on the video before the blast. So I'd say it was either a 1st missile had left not enough kinetic energy to catch the plane and so self-destructed, or it was another plane there - smaller and further and without flares, or the 1st blast was from an AD missile that tried to intercept the 2nd one (we have another video with a launch towards the plane, it's either a Russian friendly fire or a try to defend the plane by killing an S-200 missile).
So a radar homing S-200 with an IR seeker for terminal guidance.. innovative.
I guess flares are always going to be less "perfectible" than ECM.
I love how the platform that is supposed to track incoming weapons for S-300 and S-400 to knock down manages to get fragged by something that gets intercepted all the time by orc air defense.
Two down, what, six more to go? Just wait until someone develops an air-to-air drone that can fire off a Meteor or AIM-120D...
Thank you for the update Tom. I always suspected an S-200 would be involved with some of these really long range shoot downs. Its great to see Ukrainian news sources now confirm this. Surely its till not fully confirmed from the Ukrainian military but it makes sense. Also hearing theories about F16s, seem far fetched but interesting.
Those will come when the A-50s are downed and Russians only have ground based radars left.
Come for the OSINT, stay for the Nobel-prize candidate sarcasm. You just earned another paid subscriber.
I think you mean, curdled (orcs) or to make lumpy sour or bad
S-200 is 60's era technology. It must have been modernised to hit a target at that range. Ukraine have already modernised S-200 to hit ground targets
S-200 is designed to hit ground targets from the start.
You have articles that west was surprised by this ability back in the days...
Tom, do you have any data on the number of aircraft damaged vs. destroyed in action during the Iran-Iraq War?
You have it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYxdHX8l-PA
"Russia has produced more combat jets than it lost in Ukraine in 2023" Binkov's Battlegrounds
What does that have to do with the Iran-Iraq War?
AI Bot. So intelligent it answers the question you wanted to ask😂
Things are not looking good but not as bad as the media narrative these days is.
Thank you again Tom, nice try on the orcs renaming I'll stick with the tried and true name, sounds to me like things are really heating up and the orcs are giving it their all for Putans big election
Tom, do you expect any impact on the number of sorties the Russians can conduct after the loss of this airplane or more accurately if the Krasnodar-Azov sea becomes a no-flying zone for A50s.
Readers complaining???
NOOOO!!!!!! Say it is not so!!!!!!!
Why would anyone have a problem with killing Orks???
Millions of them die everyday online, in 40K, AD&D, WFB, and more games than I could ever remember to mention.
I know!!!!!
TYRANIDS!!!!!!!!!!!!
No one would ever have a problem with TYRANIDS.
Mobiks would be Rippers or Termagaunts.
Regular soldier could be Hormagaunts or just Gaunts.
Special Forces would be Genestealers.
Airborne VDV would be Gargoyles.
....and if "People" don't like killing them....then they can try cuddling with them.....
BTW - My wife suggests using cuddling with a 'K.'
Kuddled orcs?
Sounds OK. ;-)
I know she will get a kick out of hearing/reading you say that.
My thanks as always.... :o)
Martin 'The Turtle'
BTW = Have you ever seen a "SUPPORT UKRAINE" shirt like this...specifically on the back with "PA ARNG"????
Ummmmm....how do I insert a picture here???
or this could work to explain:
https://es.aliexpress.com/item/1005004695705893.html?src=google&aff_fcid=ef579055e17f4b25a8188a18a4bf97e5-1708766039255-07531-UneMJZVf&aff_fsk=UneMJZVf&aff_platform=aaf&sk=UneMJZVf&aff_trace_key=ef579055e17f4b25a8188a18a4bf97e5-1708766039255-07531-UneMJZVf&terminal_id=73a6aa62d9cd4448b6f2ec814a5759a4&afSmartRedirect=y
Nope, never seen it before. Cool. Thanks.
In Ukraine they have not been called that for a long time. If I write how, the LGBT community will ban me. Tom, have you thought about adding payment for the armed forces of Ukraine to your articles, or is this prohibited here? For example, boats for the Marine Corps are now being assembled from Magyar. Thanks for your work. You are read in Kharkov.
I do run a collection for a Shark UAV for the 3rd SSO, but via my Facebook account only.
Zelenskyj & co is doing excellent job not to end up in a spiral of hate like Israel - Palestine.
Back in early 2022, there was a video with some actual orcs asking to stop comparing russians to them. :) I think they had a point: russian modus operandi (love for "meat wave attacks" + corruption of everything they touch up to the very ground) is more akin to the Zerg.
I still trying to understand why Coke Plant was evacuated/abandon without the fight?
In Mariupol Azov defended Azovstal for months! Coke plant looks like perfect fortress to defend!
And almost all the defenders in Mariupol were killed or captured.
There's a Telegram channel I follow that while having an anti Putin stance, claims to have sources in both Ukrainian and Russian forces. In their post on the subject, their source in ZSU said that a couple of key positions within the plant were abandoned without authorization under heavy aerial bombardment. Russians quickly took those positions, Ukrainians were unable to take them back, and without them, it wasn't viable to hold the coke plant complex. They had to organize a hasty retreat abandoning a lot of ammunition and provisions. No more details were given.
Tom, what do you think the remaining few A-50 would be of great use to Russian troops? According to the last report of Mashovets in "Tverezo info" all Russian fleet is relocated to Novorossiysk except 2 ships that are repaired in Sevastopol.
Yes, i`m so happy that i was right and guessed correctly that RF will continue to push west of Adviidvka. They seems also they taken Severne. As of today they are also claiming they took Opitne and Lastochyne, i hope it`s wrong. There are also claims 2 of the abrams are also taken out. If that information is true, it will prove Ukraine did not manage to build good enough positions.
So Soviet “ancient” weapons are superior to Americans latest Patriots? I hope that Ukrainians have more of these!
I think they are used for different types of operations.
But then USA does not have nothing that is used for THAT type of operations? Right?
Havent the foggiest. Ukraine is using everything it can get its hands on I assume. As best they can.
Do you see USA fighting here?
The US has the most powerful air force on the planet, more powerful than the next several countries combined. Generally, if you want a longer range, you make the rocket bigger. If the US do not have such SAM missiles, and I don't know if that's the case, it means they don't consider them useful. Army is a system.
I don't know why, but USAF doesn't have a long range missile like the legendary AIM-54C Phoenix of USN or the MBDA Meteor.
They seem to be happy with the AMRAAM (which is a medium range missile), because I guess that they depend on ground- and ship-based long distance missiles for this function?
I agree it's strange and I have no clue why. I doubt they rely on any ground or sea launchers as by design, their air force operates far away from any such systems. It's said that USAF fights its own war.
However, they are currently working on long range AA missiles and Meteor is going to be integrated with F-35. Therefore, I think we can now assume the US have fixed that disadvantage.
Not a Meteor integration into the F-15, F-16, F/A-18, though. And these types are still the bulk of jet fighters of USAF and USN/Marines
The AIM-120D is meanwhile in service. Should have a (claimed) range in excess of 120km.
let's suppose a typical 100 km effective kill range. Still "medium range" territory compared to the 200 km of the Meteor.