Kiev Is Burning

[Der Zeitgeist]

9 minutes ago, bojan said:

Bull. All they had to do was KO 750kV grid and everything else would have crashed w/o easy possibility of repair. That probably needed maybe one or two dozen missiles per each of 3 keypoints, and they have expended way more in attacks.

There may indeed be some political limitations to these strikes, as seeing Ukrainian cities in darkness tends to increase western military aid.

[old_goat]

I think the goal of this attack was just to test ukraine's air defense capabilities. Location of SAM batteries, their response time, their readiness, and maybe just to waste their precious ammo on Geran-2s. Also, after a few such missile strikes, ukraine will be forced to divert more air defence from the front towards to central areas. That means more freedom for Su-34s, and maybe later to begin Ka-52 operations again. 

Edited March 23 by old_goat

[crazyinsane105]

2 hours ago, Der Zeitgeist said:

I don't understand why you're surprised about that now. Russia did its first large campaign against the Ukrainian energy grid last winter ('22-'23).

It forced Ukraine to use a significant amount of their Soviet era air defense missiles, which may have been a bigger priority than the destruction of the electric grid itself. 

[Roman Alymov]

1 hour ago, old_goat said:

I think the goal of this attack was just to test ukraine's air defense capabilities. Location of SAM batteries, their response time, their readiness, and maybe just to waste their precious ammo on Geran-2s. Also, after a few such missile strikes, ukraine will be forced to divert more air defence from the front towards to central areas. That means more freedom for Su-34s, and maybe later to begin Ka-52 operations again. 

What do you mean "again"? As far as i know, Ka-52 (and Mi-28) are working daily. May be not so intensively as during "great summer offencive" - but for obvious reason of lack of targets attacking in columns over open fields....

[Roman Alymov]

Patrick Lancaster and Avdeevka locals. Interesting to see endemic conflict between industrial workers and peasants, and that old lady is saying Poltava is Western Ukraine (while it is very much Central Ukraine) - also very typical (my father in law who was from Poltava region believed everything west of his region "Western Ukraine")

 

[old_goat]

1 hour ago, Roman Alymov said:

What do you mean "again"? As far as i know, Ka-52 (and Mi-28) are working daily. May be not so intensively as during "great summer offencive" - but for obvious reason of lack of targets attacking in columns over open fields....

Yes, I was thinking about large scale use of the helicopters. Sure, there arent ukrainian tank columns, but without effective ukrainian air defense, Ka-52s could provide more support for russian troops. 

[Roman Alymov]

5 minutes ago, old_goat said:

Yes, I was thinking about large scale use of the helicopters. Sure, there arent ukrainian tank columns, but without effective ukrainian air defense, Ka-52s could provide more support for russian troops. 

Reality is the main problem is not effective ukrainian air defense, but lack of effective communication between ground forces and aviation: if no forward air observer around (and they are usually not around) platoon/company commander can't call, for example, heli patrol on duty in the area and say "there is an enemy tank firing on us from that forest belt, nice kill opportunity for you". Yes in theory aviation could do free hunt on their own, but i can't imagine pro-Ukr air defence degraded SO low. 

[bojan]

53 minutes ago, old_goat said:

Yes, I was thinking about large scale use of the helicopters. Sure, there arent ukrainian tank columns, but without effective ukrainian air defense, Ka-52s could provide more support for russian troops. 

Even w/o effective longer ranged AD there would still be enough MANPADS that any aggressive use of helicopters would lead to significant loses again.

[Yama]

7 hours ago, bojan said:

Same as in 1999, 2003, 1991 etc, pure terror over civilian population masked as "essential military targets" in order to ferment unrest. Cocksuckers, both of them.

 

What took place was actually downtuned version of what the military wanted to undertake:

"But in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, the general who commanded the bombing let it all hang out, beginning with his frustration over not being allowed to hit targets in downtown Belgrade.

"I would have gone for the head of the snake on the first night. I'd have turned the lights out the first night. I'd have dropped the bridges across the Danube," said Lt. Gen. Michael Short. "I'd hit five or six military headquarters in downtown Belgrade. [Serb leader Slobodan] Milosevic and his cronies would have waked up the first morning asking what the hell was going on.""

Short thought that bombing Yugoslavian armed forces in Kosovo was quite useless, and what he wanted was to hit Yugoslavian infrastructure quick and hard, but wussy politicians watered down the campaign.

[crazyinsane105]

5 hours ago, Der Zeitgeist said:

There may indeed be some political limitations to these strikes, as seeing Ukrainian cities in darkness tends to increase western military aid.

Or…the Russians intend on occupying these areas and don’t want to destroy something that will take a god awful time for them to repair is also a guess. 
 

Same goes for not wanting to drop the bridges across the Dniper. Given that Russia can produce 30 Iskanders a month and has hundreds of NK missiles, dropping the bridges aren’t a problem anymore, but absolutely no sign of this either 

[crazyinsane105]

2 hours ago, old_goat said:

Yes, I was thinking about large scale use of the helicopters. Sure, there arent ukrainian tank columns, but without effective ukrainian air defense, Ka-52s could provide more support for russian troops. 

Ukraine has thousands of effective MANPADs. This simply isn’t an option 

[sunday]

https://gab.com/Vorontzov/posts/112147799799321318

Quote

Ukrainian sources report as many as fourteen TU-95MS Russian strategic heavy bombers getting ready for destroying targets in Ukraine

If the flight is a combat mission, we expect missiles to be launched at around 3:30-4:30 (1:30-2:30 GMT).

Missiles in Ukrainian airspace at around 05:00 - 06:00 (03:00 - 04:00 GMT), Ukrainian sources say.

Unconfirmed, ofc.

[bojan]

1 hour ago, Yama said:

What took place was actually downtuned version of what the military wanted to undertake:...

They also wanted to hit Djerdap Hydro-electric plant. Guess that Romanians and Bulgarians would have been overjoyed...

 

Edited March 24 by bojan

[mandeb48]

7 hours ago, Der Zeitgeist said:

There may indeed be some political limitations to these strikes, as seeing Ukrainian cities in darkness tends to increase western military aid.

 Although from a military point of view it makes perfect sense to attack the electrical grid. The result of a systematic attack would have an effect on the aging Ukrainian population that would be catastrophic. The younger population would escape to Europe but thousands of elderly people would die (to the delight of the Western media) and that would erode internal support for the war, Russia's international position and would totally alienate the population that could remain within a new frontier.

[crazyinsane105]

The 750 kV (kilovolt) network in Ukraine has been destroyed or critically damaged by missile attacks, with more than half of the power transmission infrastructure being affected. For example, on November 3, 2022, the South Ukraine nuclear power plant lost connection to one of its three 750 kV lines, causing the plant to reduce the power of one of its reactors by 50%. On November 23, 2022, Russian missile attacks caused widespread blackouts across the country, causing reactors at the South Ukraine plant to automatically disconnect from the grid. Ukrainian energy workers restored the operation of the PL-750kV Dniprovska external overhead line on March 22, 2024, after it was damaged by a Russian missile strike. 

Before the war, Ukraine had four 750 kV lines and six 330 kV lines, but only one remains operational today. The IAEA Director General has said that even if one back-up line becomes available again, it is far from sufficient

[Roman Alymov]

5 hours ago, crazyinsane105 said:

Or…the Russians intend on occupying these areas and don’t want to destroy something that will take a god awful time for them to repair is also a guess. 
 

It is self-illusion pro-Ukrainias would left bridges (or any other useful assets) standing when retreating. Usually they blow up bridges beforehand when possible.

[Roman Alymov]

2 hours ago, crazyinsane105 said:

The 750 kV (kilovolt) network in Ukraine has been destroyed or critically damaged by missile attacks, with more than half of the power transmission infrastructure being affected. For example, on November 3, 2022, the South Ukraine nuclear power plant lost connection to one of its three 750 kV lines, causing the plant to reduce the power of one of its reactors by 50%. On November 23, 2022, Russian missile attacks caused widespread blackouts across the country, causing reactors at the South Ukraine plant to automatically disconnect from the grid. Ukrainian energy workers restored the operation of the PL-750kV Dniprovska external overhead line on March 22, 2024, after it was damaged by a Russian missile strike. 

Before the war, Ukraine had four 750 kV lines and six 330 kV lines, but only one remains operational today. The IAEA Director General has said that even if one back-up line becomes available again, it is far from sufficient

That is not enough, taking into account massive redundancy of Soviet energy system inhereted by Ukraine. This system was created not only to supply huge heavy industry of Soviet Ukraine, but also provide power for Eastern Block countries. Now with industry mostly gone and population halved, thgey got plenty of reserves. More over, they are even exporting energy from time to time

(from 12.02.2024. Процесс роста экспорта продолжается. Украинцы под это дело заявили… | Гугл рулит) | Дзен (dzen.ru) )

By the way this author Гугл рулит) | Дзен (dzen.ru) is strongly recommended if you want to know more about energy infrastructure. Below is his take on resent strikes

"A blow to the Ukrainian energy system on March 22, 2024. "For Belgorod!"

A small digression in connection with recent events.

An attempt to intimidate people with a terrorist attack who remember Budyonnovsk, Nord-Ost and Beslan – well, such a thing. As well as blaming what happened on the FSB (even then it rolled only for the stoned) or on ISIS (banned in Russia, they can not only take responsibility, but also hand over all the perpetrators, with an operation plan, etc. – anyway, no one will believe that the Ukrainians had nothing to do with it, fortunately they themselves trumpeted about his worldwide struggle with Russia).

Condolences to the victims and their families…

The March 22 strike immediately began to unwind as the most powerful blow for the entire time of the conflict, of course, with the help of Ukrainians and, much less without it, with the support of our (and not only) media. It was done simply – all missiles and UAVs launched in Ukraine (about 150 units) were "redirected" to the power grid. However, to put it mildly, this is not the case – our Ministry of Defense reported as follows: "Today, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation have inflicted a massive strike with high-precision long-range air, sea, land-based and unmanned aerial vehicles on energy facilities, the military-industrial complex, railway junctions, arsenals, locations of formations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and foreign mercenaries" That is, energy, although in the first place, is by no means the only one.

Even on the diagram provided by Ukrenergo, it is quite easy to find target objects that are not related to the energy system: 1 - petrochemicals in the Stryi – Kalush area, 2 – Starokonstantinov airfield, 3 – Voznesensk airfield

And the result, frankly speaking, was not very impressive.

Changes in cross-border flows 21-22.03.2024.
It is interesting to compare the schedule of cross-border flows on March 21 and 22. If on March 21 this graph (thin black – hourly chart, thick – its polynomial approximation) has quite a usual two–peak appearance (at night – export, in the morning – morning peak of consumption, in the afternoon – a drop in imports up to exports (depending on load and weather), in the evening - evening peak), then on March 22 (red lines) the morning peak turned out to be more solid, and there was no decline after it (the same solar generation completely went to compensate for the lost heat- and hydrogenation), but the evening peak flew far beyond gigawatts (and this is taking into account the fact that part of the load remained disconnected anyway).

And in November 2022, the drop in gigawatts happened in an hour)

You can enter the following scale of attacks on the Ukrainian energy system:

1) Local strikes on individual energy facilities or even groups of energy facilities. The most striking examples are the Kurakhovskaya thermal power plant or the attacks on traction substations in the spring of 2022;

2) Regional strikes related to the operation of the energy systems of any regions. An example is a blow on 09/15/2022. Here it is worth highlighting the strikes affecting the work of the Kiev power plant, responsible for the work of the Ukrainian government, which directly receives electricity from two nuclear power plants, one thermal power plant, three thermal power plants, one hydroelectric power plant and one hydroelectric power plant. It is also the most protected in Ukraine. But they usually fall into the following categories in the campaign;

3) Systemic shocks that do not lead to the shutdown of nuclear power plants. So to speak, the general weakening of the energy system. The first strikes of October 2022 are just like that;

4) Systemic strikes aimed at shutting down nuclear power plants. The goal is a blackout, however, even at their height (November 2022), they did not seek to consolidate the blackout, allowing the connectivity of the power system to be restored. Examples are strikes on 15.11, 23.11 and 05.12.2022.

Accordingly, yesterday we observed some hybrid of a regional and systemic strike: the concentration on the frontline zone is obvious (some objects were given increased attention), but at the same time we did not forget about the rest of the regions of Ukraine. It is possible to say with good probability that this blow is for Belgorod, however, its relationship with the same February strikes is quite visible.

A lyrical digression. For some reason, it is generally assumed that when the "answer" flies, it is not quite good, because there must be some kind of cunning plan to which such changes cause almost irreparable harm. However, "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" was not invented by us at all, it is from the Old Testament. And this principle has always been followed (tried to follow), even in modern wars. If you look at the history of the same World War II, then there will also be more than one or two similar "answers". For example, there was no special strategic thought in the strikes on Berlin in August 1941 - however, it was decided to answer for Moscow (the first German raid was on 07/22/1941). Or an even more striking example of a "response" with a psychological bias is the American Dullitla raid (this is a pure "response" for Pearl Harbor – the task to develop something like this was given on 12/21/1941). ****

I'm going back to Ukraine. So, what do we know at the moment? One point catches the eye: a very serious slotting of some objects (actually for destruction) and not so much of others, they achieved a shutdown, well, that's good. I.e., we can assume the following: the initial plan assumed further strikes to create problems with power supply in the frontline, hence such serious and consistent strikes to knock out part of the power plants (DneproGES-2 and Kharkiv CHP-5). But after persistent attempts by the Ukrainians to break into the territory of Russia, and especially after the constant shelling of Belgorod, most likely, a central control unit was received for a wider coverage of the energy system, but at the same time – without overkill.

The most serious consequence of strikes on the power system is the shutdown of Ukrainian nuclear power plants (let me remind you that there have been no strikes on them and they are unlikely to be, even on switchgears that are located at a considerable distance from the actual power units). In November-December 2022, this was achieved by creating an imbalance of generation / consumption of electricity, and they did it in two directly opposite ways: either massively knocking out thermal generation (while not touching the power units themselves, it is enough to turn off the switchgear), or, conversely, influencing the switchgear of substations (again, there is no need beat the autotransformers). During yesterday's attack, both power plants and substations were attacked, which could not (and did not) lead to an imbalance of the energy system.

As mentioned above, two power plants have the most serious consequences: DneproGES-2 and Kharkov CHP-5

It should be noted the work of the SBU – the number of photos / videos is not large at all. Therefore, it is necessary to judge the affected objects by external manifestations – disconnections of consumers or changes in the flow pattern.

Most of the evidence was about the strikes on DneproGES-2, which fell in the turbine hall. At the same time, it is worth noting that I have not come across such materials on DneproGES-1, which casts doubt on the voiced thesis that it also came under attack.

If from the point of view of power, DneproGES-1 and 2 are approximately equivalent, then for the connectivity of the power system, the 150 kV and 330 kV switchgear (it is also the Right-Bank PS) of DneproGES-1 is much more important: if only two 150 kV overhead lines go from DGPP-2 to their left bank, then from the ORU DGPP-1 two 330 kV overhead lines depart (one to the left bank) and eleven to 150 kV (five to the left). There would be much more problems if DneproGES-1 was put out of operation.

There are/were eight power units at DneproGES-2, with a capacity of 5x120, 1x119 and 2x104.5 MW.

A fire in the turbine hall of DneproGES-2, a ruptured gas pipeline running over the bridge is burning on the left.

The scale of damage can be estimated as follows: two nearby power units are out, the next pair is most likely also, the next one is to go under repair (there is a fire shining there, i.e. there may well be a fire, but there is no external penetration, i.e. it did not arrive there), and the extreme pair is presumably without damage. Interestingly, apparently, the generator transformers standing openly between the turbine hall and the dam have survived.

DNEPROGES has one very important role in the Ukrainian energy system – 6 power units on it take part in secondary frequency regulation. Not to say that knocking out these blocks is deadly, there are similar power units in Ukraine (first of all, the Burshtyn thermal power plant) plus no one has canceled the connection with Europe, but their absence will definitely not add stability to the energy system. If the target of the attack on DneproGES-2 was precisely the blocks with AVRPM (automatic secondary regulation of frequency and power), then this may be the beginning of the end of the Ukrainian energy system as a system.

In this regard, the role of the Moldovan GRES, which controls Moldovan transit to Romania and is equipped with at least two power units with AVRPM, is sharply increasing. Accordingly, the conflict in Transnistria may well end the era of electricity in Ukraine.

Kharkiv CHP-5, apparently, was even less lucky.

Given the fact that there are only three generator transformers on it, and they are located in a space of 150 meters, then, most likely, they (as well as transformers of their own needs and volt-adders located in the same row) are not used. Accordingly, the CHP-5 power plant will not work soon – after replacing at least one of the transformers (included). With heat generation, options are possible.

With the rest of the damage, the situation, as mentioned above, is worse – there is not enough evidence. Let's take a Rybar's map as an example and analyze it by specific objects.

1) Burshtyn TPP. On the one hand, the flow to Transcarpathia that flew into the sky speaks for the blow to it (yesterday it peaked at as much as 910 MW, which is much more than the consumption of Transcarpathia proper). On the other hand, it flew away quite smoothly, which rather indicates the reversal of the thermal power plant to the interior than its emergency shutdown;

2) Substations of the Khmelnitsky region. Judging by the scale of the outages (200 thousand subscribers), we are actually talking about damage to the 330 kV substation (rather Khmelnitsky, fortunately there are photos of damage in the city);

But do not forget about option B. Emergency automation systems (the same ACR – automatic frequency unloading) can turn off consumers of the 3rd category (the same residential sector) with a lack of generation. And then you can take your time to turn them back on, since for this you need to increase electricity imports from Europe. Which, by the way, the Europeans themselves limited to 1,700 MW. Yesterday, Ukrainians came very close to this limit…

3) Blackouts in Odessa. Perhaps the most incomprehensible thing about yesterday's strike. Flows through Moldova show that all 330 kV (and below) lines are fully operational – that is, they have consumers on the Ukrainian side. My assumption is related to Ladyzhinskaya and Krivoy Rog thermal power plants – they were attacked after all (DTEK reported the defeat of several of its thermal power plants), as a result of which generation on them is limited and there is simply not enough electricity for the most distant consumers (this is just the area of Odessa);

4) The blow to the Ukrainka PS is shown in the logic of outages in the Kirovograd region. But there is not one substation, respectively, outages can be in another place, and without blows – it is banal because of the same Ladyzhinskaya thermal power plant;

5) The impact on the 750 kV Dneprovskaya substation explains the outages around itself very well, but is not confirmed by the IAEA, which attributes the shutdown of the 750 kV overhead line to a breakdown somewhere in the fields. Given the fact that Ukrainian combine harvesters periodically break 750 kV overhead lines, the situation is quite real;

6) Attacks on Konotop and Mirgorod have been announced, obviously in the light of outages in the Poltava and Sumy regions. But there are quite enough alternative options (Sumy-Severnye, Sumy, Poltava, Kremenchug), although it is more realistic that, again, they simply dropped the load due to problems at the Zmievskaya TPP;

7) Pridneprovskaya TPP – very likely. There were few materials on it in February, but now the number of people willing to take pictures has become even smaller. The blow to it quite explains the outages in part of the Dnipropetrovsk region;

😎 The strike on DneproGES-1 is also opposed by the fact that Ukrenergo also declares the presence of light in the Zaporozhye region. Although, of course, the 750 kV Zaporizhia-750 substation can also act as a source of electricity;

9) In Kharkov, Rybar drew a lot of things, but such a number of blows is not really necessary when the Zmievskaya TPP and the Zalutino PS are damaged. But with a massive impact, this should not be excluded: 330 kV power supply can be restored, but without a 330/110 kV autotransformer, this will not help. Such a massive capture of autotransformers just confirms the idea of de-energizing the front line.

Something like that. I think that now the comrades in the Ministry of Defense have been instructed to develop a new plan. Or permission to use a previously developed one. Let's wait.

In general, it turned out very clearly: the "terrorist" state releases 150 missiles and UAVs at civilian objects, and the death toll (including from the work of its own Air Defence) is estimated at a maximum of dozens. Meanwhile, the "defenders of democracy" are organizing a terrorist attack with more than a hundred dead with the help of several Tajiks. May be we should learn from the experience?"

 

 

[KV7]

9 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

Reality is the main problem is not effective ukrainian air defense, but lack of effective communication between ground forces and aviation: if no forward air observer around (and they are usually not around) platoon/company commander can't call, for example, heli patrol on duty in the area and say "there is an enemy tank firing on us from that forest belt, nice kill opportunity for you". Yes in theory aviation could do free hunt on their own, but i can't imagine pro-Ukr air defence degraded SO low. 

Perhaps the solution is to put local attack helicopters etc. into the standard artillery fires and FVP drone protocol. I cannot see why a platoon commander etc. cannot just ask for a support mission against e.g some armour in a vicinity and let some dedicated command unit work out the best form of attacking it and make the required requests.

The additional difficulty for attack helicopters is their longer range, so you need a higher level unit to allocate the resources.

[Roman Alymov]

5 minutes ago, KV7 said:

Perhaps the solution is to put local attack helicopters etc. into the standard artillery fires and FVP drone protocol. I cannot see why a platoon commander etc. cannot just ask for a support mission against e.g some armour in a vicinity and let some dedicated command unit work out the best form of attacking it and make the required requests.

As usual - there are not enough trained people on the ground, not enough equipment (note aviation and ground forces use different radio bands, and in addition to that often infantry got only WWII-style land phone line or crowdfunded radio to communicate even to own command) etc. Usual realities of big war, worsened by lack of acknowlegement of the fact it is war and there are shorcommings civil society can't cover.

[ink]

Another big missile attack last night. Polish airspace violated (for less than a minute, it seems).

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/kyiv-lviv-under-russian-air-attack-poland-activates-aircraft-officials-say-2024-03-24/

But no real info on any of the targets. 

[Roman Alymov]

1 hour ago, ink said:

Another big missile attack last night. Polish airspace violated (for less than a minute, it seems).

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/kyiv-lviv-under-russian-air-attack-poland-activates-aircraft-officials-say-2024-03-24/

But no real info on any of the targets. 

Pro-Rus take  (https://rybar.ru/piwigo/i.php?/upload/2024/03/24/20240324122755-bb4d433c-xx.jpg)

On the combined attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Sevastopol and Crimea

The very next day after the terrorist attack in Moscow, Ukrainian formations carried out a massive combined attack on the Crimean Peninsula, in which at least 12 tactical aircraft were involved.

Nine aircraft (presumably Su-24M and Su-27) took off from Starokonstantinov, two MiG-29s from Uman airfield and another Su-27 from Mirgorod. After reaching the frontier, Storm Shadow/SCALP, ADM-160 and Neptune missiles were launched in Zatoka, New Odessa and Snigirevka.

Sevastopol was subjected to the most extensive attack. Two missiles tried to hit the parking lot of warships. The targets were shot down, but the debris fell in the area of the pier in Sevastopol Bay, no serious damage was recorded. (in another report, glasses on 5 passanger boats that provide cross-harbor transportation were broken - RA)

▪️ The use of SCALP cruise missiles was noted at the ship repair plant. One of the missiles failed to fire its warhead (in another report, rumor is this unexploded warhead hit Azov landing ship - RA), and the second hit the dock. There is currently no data on the nature of the damage, but the absence of any smoke may indicate a rapid localization of the fire.

This time, the Armed Forces of Ukraine began to strike at the civilian infrastructure of Sevastopol. The target was two apartment buildings and two municipalities. One civilian was killed due to the hits, and four others were injured.

Two more "Storms" were used to attack a building previously used by the Black Sea Fleet in the central part of the city. (it was Ukrainian Navy communication centre before 2014 - RA) However, it was empty, so apart from physical damage to the infrastructure, there were no casualties.

The same can be said about the Cossack Bay area. Ukrainian channels talked all night about the monstrous arrivals, but the rocket landed in a field near the special operations forces training ground. There are no casualties.

In the west of Crimea, the Black Sea coast came under attack. At first, the AFU intended to hit the barracks with four aircraft-type drones. The UAVs flew at extremely low altitude, but were shot down by air defense teams.

A little later, several Neptune anti-ship missiles were fired from the Odessa region, which were shot down on approach to the Black Sea by Russian Aerospace Forces aircraft.

In the central part of Crimea, Ukrainian formations attacked an oil depot in Gvardeyskoye in the early morning with drones flying at extremely low altitude. Six of them were destroyed by the calculation of the ZRPC "Pantsir-S1" of the 31st Air Force and Air Defense divisions.

Three more fell on the territory of the energy facility, which caused a fire. But the main oil reservoirs were not damaged, which allowed the fire to be extinguished quickly and without casualties by the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

The enemy also tried to hit the deployment point of the 126 separate Guards brigade of coastal defense in the Perevalny area with missile weapons. Thanks to the air defense units, nine missiles were shot down.

As you can see, this time the AFU tried to hit several targets at once. This can be clearly seen in the geography of the raid: starting from the west of Crimea and ending with the central part and Sevastopol. In total, over 40 missiles and drones of various types were used.

Once again, the AFU used deceptive missiles to mislead 31 division. Unfortunately, not all targets were intercepted. However, timely measures have made it possible to reduce the damage from strikes both in the Black Sea Fleet and in other units on the peninsula.

The saddest thing is that civilians were injured in the attack, who became the target of a targeted attack by the enemy, which again raises the question of what the so-called Ukraine."

[ink]

Thanks for that Roman. My original post was about the Russian attacks on Ukraine but it was interesting to read about the Ukrainian salvo also.

Seems the Ukrainian air force is pretty active. Very impressive given the conditions under which it has to operate. 

[sunday]

5 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

That is not enough, taking into account massive redundancy of Soviet energy system inhereted by Ukraine. This system was created not only to supply huge heavy industry of Soviet Ukraine, but also provide power for Eastern Block countries. Now with industry mostly gone and population halved, thgey got plenty of reserves. More over, they are even exporting energy from time to time

(...)

That makes sense, thanks.

[crazyinsane105]

2 hours ago, ink said:

Thanks for that Roman. My original post was about the Russian attacks on Ukraine but it was interesting to read about the Ukrainian salvo also.

Seems the Ukrainian air force is pretty active. Very impressive given the conditions under which it has to operate. 

Ukrainian Air Force is probably based in Western Ukraine and only utilizes bases closer to the front for quick refueling. Without a doubt they are able to survive as VKS and Russian SAM presence is nearly non existent in parts of Western Ukraine 

[Gavin-Phillips]

2 minutes ago, crazyinsane105 said:

Ukrainian Air Force is probably based in Western Ukraine and only utilizes bases closer to the front for quick refueling. Without a doubt they are able to survive as VKS and Russian SAM presence is nearly non existent in parts of Western Ukraine 

Someone recently commented on the fact that Russian helicopter losses would be high due to Ukrainian MANPADS.  How common are MANPADS within the Russian armoured units?  I realise they aren't exactly at the same level as a Buk, Tor-M1, etc but they should at least provide defence against helicopters and slower aircraft?