The Ukrainian military shot down a hypersonic Russian missile over Kyiv using the newly acquired Patriot missile defense system, an air force commander confirmed on Saturday.
It’s the first time Ukraine has been known to intercept one of Moscow’s most sophisticated weapons, after receiving the long-sought, American-made defense batteries from the U.S., Germany and the Netherlands.
“Yes, we shot down the ‘unique’ Kinzhal,” Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk said on Telegram, referring to a Kh-47 missile, which flies at 10 times the speed of sound. “It happened during the night time attack on May 4 in the skies of the Kyiv region.”
Ukraine confirmed that two Patriot batteries were operational last month, following training on the system from the U.S. and Germany, according to the Kyiv Independent. The interception of the hypersonic missile also represents a major success for the Patriot technology, in use on the battlefield after 20 years of upgrades.
Kyiv had initially denied that it had shot down the Kinzhal missile.
Ukraine first asked Washington for Patriot systems in 2021, well before Russia’s current war of aggression began in February 2022. The U.S. and Germany have each sent at least one Patriot battery to Ukraine; and the Netherlands said it has provided two.
Separately, a well-known Russian nationalist writer was injured in a car bomb, reported TASS, Russia’s state-owned news service. Zakhar Prilepin was wounded in the Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod, in a blast that killed one person, according to the report.
A Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman said the blast was the “direct responsibility of the U.S. and Britain,” without providing evidence, according to Reuters.
Shot_Play_4014 on May 6th, 2023 at 18:02 UTC »
Some things need clarification.
Hypersonic means mach 5+ over some portion of the flight envelope. What the non-technical PowerPoint jockeys refer to as "hypersonics" are just HGVs or HCMs (Hypersonic glide vehicles, Hypersonic cruise missile).
All HGVs and HCMs operate at high altitudes and dive down on their targets.
HGVs/HCMs are designed to be maneuverable in the midcourse portion of the flight envelope and offer no inherent benefit over other designs in the terminal portion. There's no free lunch in engineering; midcourse flight performance comes at the expensive of other things.
MaRVs ("non-hypersonic" by the PowerPoint definition) are specifically designed to be maneuverable in the terminal flight envelope. This is something they excel at.
PAC-3 has already destroyed hypersonic MaRVs in testing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmjxQM2I7JU&ab_channel=sferrin2 . PAC-3 is a relatively small missile that makes its interception in the terminal phase of flight.
HGVs and HCMs are more vulnerable in the midcourse phase than traditional "ballistic" missiles carrying MIRVs, penaids, and using simulation/anti-simulation techniques.
That said, HGVs and HCMs are very useful. But, like all tools, they are better at certain things than others. PAC-3 has proven capability against hypersonic MaRVs and likely has capability against HCMs and HGVs (provided the target is inside PAC-3's defensive footprint). Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm not aware of PAC-3 being sent to Ukraine. This Kh-47M2 may have been shot down by another weapon.
According_to_Mission on May 6th, 2023 at 15:08 UTC »
Not very surprising, the Kinzhal is essentially just an air-launched ballistic missile, which is one of the targets Patriots are designed to defeat. It’s just hyped up as an unstoppable wonder-weapon by Russian propaganda.
Soros_Liason_Agent on May 6th, 2023 at 13:57 UTC »
The US has had hypersonic missiles since the 1970s.
The fanfare around hypersonic missiles is not because they can go fast (that's part of it but as I said in point 1, US has had hypersonics since 1970s; its not new). The fanfare is around manoeuvrable hypersonic missiles.
Manoeuvrable hypersonic missiles are missiles which unlike the prior hypersonic missiles from the 1970s, do not follow a pre-designated and pre-calculated trajectory. e.g. they are MUCH harder to intercept because you don't really know where they will be at what point. With the missiles from the 1970s, they largely would reach hypersonic speeds on re-entering the earths atmosphere, and while some had a tiny bit of manoeuvrability (MIRVs are a missile with many warheads and they need to slow down and manoeuvre to get a good spread of their warheads for instance) they were not the same as the modern manoeuvrable hypersonic missiles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0n3fjoacL20
I've probably said something which is wrong, but this video from Perun (IMO the best military analyst on youtube) goes into great detail about everything and there's far more that I missed.