Moscow Announces Accomplished Evaluation of Nuclear-Powered Storm Petrel Missile

Russia has tested the reactor-driven Burevestnik long-range missile, as reported by the state's senior general.

"We have launched a multi-hour flight of a reactor-driven projectile and it traversed a vast distance, which is not the ultimate range," Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov told the Russian leader in a televised meeting.

The low-altitude advanced armament, first announced in the past decade, has been described as having a possible global reach and the capacity to evade anti-missile technology.

Foreign specialists have in the past questioned over the projectile's tactical importance and the nation's statements of having effectively trialed it.

The national leader declared that a "final successful test" of the armament had been conducted in the previous year, but the assertion was not externally confirmed. Of over a dozen recorded evaluations, just two instances had partial success since the mid-2010s, based on an arms control campaign group.

Gen Gerasimov said the projectile was in the sky for fifteen hours during the evaluation on 21 October.

He said the projectile's ascent and directional control were evaluated and were found to be meeting requirements, as per a national news agency.

"Therefore, it demonstrated high capabilities to circumvent anti-missile and aerial protection," the news agency stated the general as saying.

The missile's utility has been the topic of vigorous discussion in defence and strategic sectors since it was first announced in recent years.

A 2021 report by a American military analysis unit concluded: "A reactor-driven long-range projectile would give Russia a singular system with global strike capacity."

However, as a global defence think tank commented the identical period, Russia confronts major obstacles in developing a functional system.

"Its entry into the nation's arsenal arguably hinges not only on resolving the substantial engineering obstacle of ensuring the consistent operation of the atomic power system," analysts stated.

"There were numerous flight-test failures, and an incident resulting in multiple fatalities."

A armed forces periodical cited in the analysis asserts the missile has a range of between 6,200 and 12,400 miles, enabling "the projectile to be stationed across the country and still be capable to strike targets in the United States mainland."

The same journal also says the weapon can operate as low as 164 to 328 feet above the surface, causing complexity for aerial protection systems to stop.

The missile, code-named Skyfall by a foreign security organization, is believed to be driven by a nuclear reactor, which is supposed to activate after solid fuel rocket boosters have launched it into the air.

An investigation by a news agency last year located a location 475km above the capital as the possible firing point of the missile.

Utilizing space-based photos from August 2024, an analyst informed the agency he had detected several deployment sites under construction at the site.

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