Worthy Christian News > World News > U.S. Researchers Claim to Identify Likely Launch Location of Russia’s New Nuclear-Powered Missile

U.S. Researchers Claim to Identify Likely Launch Location of Russia’s New Nuclear-Powered Missile

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Two US researchers believe they have discovered the probable deployment site of Russia’s 9M730 Burevestnik, a new nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed cruise missile, Reuters reported exclusively on September 2. Described by Russian President Vladimir Putin as “invincible,” the 9M730 Burevestnik missile is referred to by NATO as “SSC-X-9 Skyfall.”

According to Putin, the Burevestnik missile has an almost unlimited range and can evade US missile defenses, Reuters reports. However, Reuters noted, “some Western experts dispute [Putin’s]claims and the Burevestnik’s strategic value, saying it will not add capabilities that Moscow does not already have and risks a radiation-spewing mishap.”

In any event, two researchers have told Reuters that images taken on July 26 by the Planet Labs commercial satellite firm show that a construction site bordering a nuclear warhead storage facility located 295 miles (475 km) north of Moscow is the Burevestnik’s missile’s potential deployment site.
This site is known as both “Vologda-20” and “Chebsara,” Reuters said.

An analyst with the CNA research and analysis organization, Decker Eveleth told Reuters he believes the imagery shows nine horizontal launch pads under construction. Eveleth said the pads are set in three groups inside high berms to protect them during an attack or to prevent an accidental explosion in detonating missiles in the others.

“The berms are linked by roads to what Eveleth concluded are likely buildings where the missiles and their components would be serviced, and to the existing complex of five nuclear warhead storage bunkers,” Reuters reports.

The site is “for a large, fixed missile system and the only large, fixed missile system that they’re (Russia) currently developing is the Skyfall,” Eveleth told Reuters.