Russia 'Shoots down' UAV

[Satellite_Driver]

From The Times: Russian jet 'shoots down' Georgian spy plane

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article3791435.ece

With some nice drones-eye view of what is definitely a MiG-29, and what I presume is either an AA-8 or AA-11 - either way, it appears to do what it says on the tin, although provided it's putting out a sufficient IR signature a drone is hardly the most challenging of targets.

According to Wikipedia* the Georgian Air Force operates three Elbit Hermes 450 drones. From what you can see of the airframe in the video, and the pictures here

http://www.israeli-weapons.com/weapons/aircraft/uav/hermes_450/Hermes_450.html

I'd say that they now operate two of them.

(*Yes, I know, but I don't have ready access to Jane's these days...)

[angels]

Nice one.....:ok:

[Gweedo]

Some interesting footage here on the BBC website showing what it's like to be shot down from the perspective of a UAV

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7359514.stm

[forget]

UAV. Or was it a bad joke :hmm:

[mr fish]

personally, i'd have used my cannon:E

[L J R]

....and what is that Plotter?,.... that UAVs are comming, or they don't risk people for those Dirty, Dangerous, and Dull tasks?...at a fraction of the pricer of high tech manned aircraft, they may be the sort of thing that you might want in those types of situations. No prisoners paraded through Red Square these days.

[effortless]

I wonder if he meant to poke the pickle. Could be a case of "Whoops, oh sh*t". :}

[Load Toad]

Any reaction from Skynet?

[TOPBUNKER]

They're not the only ones who destroy UAVs.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=561191&in_page_id=1770

From the Daily Mail 22 April...

An RAF bomber deliberately destroyed a £10million British spy plane to prevent terrorists accessing its secrets.
The unmanned surveillance system, the Reaper UAV, crash landed in Afghanistan during a covert operation. Special forces were dropped in to the crash site by helicopter to recover the plane's top secret data - believed to include a high-intensity camera and computer memory chips.
An RAF Harrier jet was then scrambled to blow up the stricken aircraft using a laser-guided bomb in a bid to stop the Taliban from discovering its sensitive data.

[HalloweenJack]

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/04/21/georgia.russia.ap/index.html

it would seem that the UAV was operating over Abkhazian airspace and was shot down by a Russian MiG-29 , based in the town of Gudauta in support of the local government.
apparantly Georgia bought 2, Elbit Hermes 450 from Israel this year - but both have now been shot down , the first on march 18th with parts pulled from the black sea and this one today;
it does begger the question - if this is the second shoot down , why only mention this one :P
oh wait they got a video of russia doing it ;)

[BentStick]

Is there such a thing as synthetic SA and is it worth the time & $$ to amend the UAV syllabus to include BFM? :zzz:

[TEEEJ]

I wonder if the Georgians will ask the U.S. for Stingers to mount on their UAVs? An Iraqi Air Force MiG-25 shot down a Predator back in 2002 with an AAM. The Predator can be seen launching a Stinger, but the Iraqi missile got there first. MiG-25/Predator clip start at 00:22.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=wWUR3sgKUV8

TJ

[mr fish]

stinger armed predator v mig 25, now THATS what i call a price difference. i wonder where the kill decal would have gone if it had won??

[HalloweenJack]

No politics, just few observations: This is about the recent
video, say
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHFDuBWuWME&feature=related
or anywhere else (BBC seems to have a better quality video,
but it is harder to access.
It appears that the images of the coastline are genuine, and
you can match the actual area to that on Google Earth. Just
play with it a little bit.

To identify the place:
----------------------
Install GoogleEarth, and then look at the east coast of
Black see and find place called "Ochamchira". Note that the
quality of the image on Googearth is not very good specifically
in this place and the area of interest is in a brown rectangle,
which is darger and than the surrounding rectangles, which
are mostly green. Once you find "Ochamchira" on google Earth
go a little bit south along the coast, until you see a small
town called "Meore Gudava" it is labelled on Google Earth
maps. This place is characterized by an identation on the
coast line, and a river which goes almost perpendicular
to the coast, them makes 90-degree left turn and enters to
the Sea.
Stop the video at the moment when you can see wheel
of the UAV in the upper-left corner of the screen no more
than 1/6 of the wheel must be visible: if more roll the
movie back a little bit. At this moment on the right
portion of the screen you shoold see and recognize
the river making 90-degree right turn, the identation
of the coast, and the city of "Meore Gudava".
Now back to Google Earth south from Meore Gudava observe
a narrow triangular strip of land free of vegetation, which
looks lighter than the surrounding (the sharp edge of the
triangle points south). Also you will see a dark spot a bit
further south along the coast.
Roll back movie, so that you about 2 seconds before the
wheel appears: you should recognize the spot and the
triangle.
Based on what I see in the movie, the UAV is off-shore,
a bit south from the black spot. I would place the UAV at
42 deg 30' North
41 deg 30' East
Given that the difference in north-south direction between
Meore Gudava and the black spot is 5', or 5 nautical miles,
or 9 kilometers, cooordinate, and given the ~60 angle of
the coast relatively to the screen, and the way how view
moves, I would estimate the distance to the coast from the
UAV at about 6 km, and altitude of the UAV about the same,
6km.

[ Yes, in is well inside Abhaz territorial waters, for
those who cares ]

The video of the coastline in genuine.

[ If you assume that this video is correct, the UAV was
shot down would fall into the Sea: there is simply no
other way. This is consistent with Abkhaz claim of the
plane shot down on March 18 (it fell into the Sea and
they could not recover pieces; Georgia denied then and
still denies today that that incident ever took place).
It is NOT CONSISTENT with last Sunday, April 20 shutdown:
this time the UAV was shot down over land, and Abkhaz's
quickly recovered the wreckage and show it on TV.
I personally believe that both events took place, and
therefore TWO Georgian UAVs were shot down in two month.
There are also unconfirmed claims by Abkhazs about shoting
down another UAV last year, deep over land, when they
could not recover wreckage because of mountains.
Russia maintains that the UAVs were wrightfully shot
down, but yields all credits to Abkhazs. Abkkazs
insists that they did it. Georgia admits only one of
the two confirmed cases, and gives the glory to
Russians.
Personally I would love to have one of the Russian
generals saying "Yes, we did it, and it is correct,
and every mf...ker flying there will be downed in a
manner shown in the movie". But this is not what they
say: in fact, they say nothing. ]


However, the image of Mig-29 firing missile has a problem:
----------------------------------------------------------

As a matter of fact, in reality Mig-29s do not have missile
rails right on the wingtips, and the missile closest to the
wing tip of the wing is about 1/3 of the wingspan inside,
see, for example
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/airdef/mig-29-fulcrum-s.jpg
Apparently, Mig-29 never had wing tip rails (no modification of
the plane ever) and it cannot have it because its wing tips are
slightly rounded (like F15), which structurally excludes
installing the missile rails at the tips.
Now, if you stop the the Georgian video at the right moment,
just when missile detaches from the wing, you will see that
the missile originates right at the wing tip. Just do clicking,
but be patient and try to do it several times. Also observe
the shine of sunlight on the left wing just before the missile
is fired to have a good idea about where the left wing ends.
Note that missile engine starts before the missile leaves
the plane, to that on this video I was able to do a double
click with my mouse observing the smog, while the missile
is still attached to the plane. (I kwow that some newer
planes like F-22 eject the missile downward, before its
engine starts -- if the missile is carried inside the
fuselage, there is simply no other way)
If it is not the 29, so what it is?
Of the russian planes only two types: Mig-25/31 (looks
like... may be(?)) and Su-27 (incl. all its derivatives)
has rails at the wing tips.
However Mig-25/31 are excluded because they look very
differently.

Su-27 is closer to Mig-29 in appearance, but its twin
tails are straight vertica and parallel to each other
(like the ones of F-15, and not bent outward, like on
the 29, or on F-18). Also 27 has a longer front portion
of the fuselage before its forward wing extentions begin,
and distinct tailboom going beyond the rear end of the
engines. See
http://www.airforce-technology.com/projects/su27/images/su27_2.jpg
The two types, Mig-29 and Su-27, routinely fly together
on airshows in close formation, so it is pretty easy to
compare how they look like from various directions for
example,
http://video.aol.com/video-detail/-----/1559426781
The plane on Georgian video is definitely looks more
like the 29 than the 27 ... but with wing tip missile
rails like Su-27. This is a common kind of sloppyness
for Universal Studios, Hollywood -- you can find a lot
of oopses like that in Hollywood movies -- but it is
an unforgivable for Georgian airforce colonel, who
should know how Mig-25 looks like.
Any comment?

[liedtoagain]

Errr.... he was inverted, giving him the BIRD!

Ah Goose, the memories :8.

[TEEEJ]

The aircraft in the vid is definately a MiG-29. I spent many years in the Royal Observer Corps doing aircraft recognition to a very high standard. The MiG-29 has completed some tight turns to get into position. Its leading edge slats will be deployed and from that camera angle the wing tip is not clearly visible.

The missile that you see will be coming from the inboard wing pylon nearest the tip. The deployment of the slats at that distance will make it appear as if the missile has come off the wing-tip. The aircraft is not a Flanker of any variant and definately not a MiG-25.

Cheers

TJ

[HalloweenJack]

Thank you - i do concur its a -29 , but what about the location?

[0497]

A little overkill. Guns would've been more kudos worthy.

[TEEEJ]

I don't see any probs with the location. The following link has a longer segment and shows the radar plot of the MiG-29.

http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-gb&vid=1ec55092-d964-463f-94e3-6cdbd84e2161

TJ