Bellona nuclear digest. March 2024
A survey of events in the field of nuclear and radiation safety relating to Russia and Ukraine.
News
Publish date: October 13, 2004
News
The Bulava, a solid fuel missile, was blasted off from the nuclear submarine Dmitry Donskoy in the White Sea, Interfax reported. Senior officers including Russias naval chief, Admiral Vladimir Kuroyedov, observed the launch. The test involved ejection of a full mockup of the “Bulava” missile from a submerged submarine “to a height of several tens of meters, where the sustainer engine is supposed to start”, Kommersant reported. During the previous test in December 2003 the submarine stayed on surface. Earlier this year, Russian military forces suffered two embarrassing failures of ballistic missile launches from submarines during highly publicised naval manoeuvres.
The Bulava (SS-NX-30) is the submarine-launched version of Russias most advanced missile, the Topol-M (SS-27) solid fuel ICBM. The SS-NX-30 is a derivative of the SS-27, except for a slight decrease in range due to conversion of the design for submarine launch. The SS-27 has is 21.9 meters long, far too large to fit in a typical submarine. The largest previously deployed Russian SLBM was the R-39 / SS-N-20 STURGEON, which was 16 meters long. The Bulava will have a range not less than 8,000 km, and is reportedly features a 550 kT yield nuclear warhead.
A survey of events in the field of nuclear and radiation safety relating to Russia and Ukraine.
Russian president Vladimir Putin has told the United Nations atomic energy watchdog that Russia plans to restart Ukraine’s embattled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, currently occupied by Russian troops and technicians, fueling worries about a serious nuclear accident on the front lines of a grinding military conflict.
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