Posted on 12/22/2006 2:49:25 AM PST by kronos77
MOSCOW: Russia's Strategic Missile Forces have conducted a successful test launch of an RS-20V Voyevoda (NATO codename SS-18 Satan) intercontinental ballistic missile, the forces' press office said Thursday.
The launch was made at 11:20 a.m. Moscow time (8:20 a.m. GMT), a spokesman said, adding that the missile, launched from Orenburg in the south Urals, successfully hit hypothetical targets on the Kamchatka Peninsula.
The launch was made to test the RS-20V's flight and technical characteristics to extend the service life of the R-36M2 missile systems to 20 years, the spokesman said.
"Before the launch, the missile had been in operation for 19 years," he said.
He said the RS-20V was a modernized version of the RS-20B.
The RS-20V Voyevoda was developed in Ukraine's design bureau Yuzhnoye. In 1988, the system, equipped with this missile, was adopted by the Missile Forces. The missile has a maximum flight range of 11,000 kilometers (6,840 miles) and a launch weight of 211 metric tons.
successfully hit hypothetical targets on the Kamchatka PeninsulaYup. That's what we were aiming at. Right there where that baby landed. That was our intended hypothetical target.
I'll remember that next time I go shooting. Why use paper targets when I can get a tighter pattern with hypothetical targets?
(Actually, I don't really need the hypotheticals.)
I newer actally got why nukes do have to hit actual target? SS-18 have MIRV, 10 independantly targeting warheads... all you have to do is to point that to desierewd (undesiered) country, or continent and fire...
Yuck
I watched The Day After again on Scifi last night. Still scary.
The warheads on ICBMs are smaller so proximity to the target matters. It's not like buckshot.
Would you like to live on the continent that has ben hit with those 10 warheads even no specified targets were hit?
I wouldnt
But that's why the Russians always built great big missiles. It's because their guidance systems suck.
L
My parents saw that movie when I was a 8 y/o kid, it was in 1985, just before Chernobyl. They were terrified.
Now, living in Serbia (than Yugoslavia) we were not part of any blcok, but were allways scared by authorites that US or USSR may push the button.
For the first time I watched Day After three years ago. And I was scared.
just to explain about what radiation does... Chernobyl is 3,000 km away from Serbia. On may 1st we were on pickink as most of people in Yugoslavia and eastern europe.
I was a kid, and I remember reading an article about "Mir" space station. We were all on the ground, and grass was so nice, soft and green. It started to rain, but not much... so we didnt wanted to go away, and stayed on pickinck.
Several days later they told us that Chernobyl exploded... ten days ago... and to stay away from rain next few weeks.
My father worked in agriculural corporatind, and he said that when workers came back from plantations, their boots (wet from grass) made Geyger-Muller counter squeek..)
And we were 3,000 km away..
Soon to be sold to Venuzuela and North Korea?
No:9
N.Korea will sonn have their own, and venezuala is too small an insignificant.
Anyway, SS-18 is ICBM, and they are reserved only for countries that made them, they are never sold abroad.
If your targets are military, the closer the hit, the more effective the strike. And if your purpose is deterrence, the more credibly you can threaten to wipe out an actual city (instead of some nearby countryside or ocean surface, in the case of coastal cities), then the more accurate your missiles are perceived to be, the more effective their deterrent threat.
They name their missile "Satan?" Egads. Nothing like a little truth in advertising.
But that's why the Russians always built great big missiles. It's because their guidance systems suck.==
As far as I red the gudance system on SS-18 good enough to hit the football field from maximum distance. Her wieght is big because she carries lot of the false warhead about 40 (10 is acual) altogether to swart possible anti-missile resistance.
The newest russian missile Topol-M small enough to be carried on the ground truck and so be hided in the widness of russian territory as the submarine in ocean. Still has 11000 km range.
WE named it Satan. They amed it in Russian
They name their missile "Satan?" Egads. Nothing like a little truth in advertising.==
"Satn" was named by american. In Soviet Union SS-18 was called "Voevoda" mean the warlord.
Satan is the NATO designation.
Does everyone need to know Air Force One landed in Omaha?
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