3M22 Zircon Hypersonic Cruise Missile

You can park a satellite... but around the equator and it is really very very high... too high to be much use with optics.

I rather suspect these tests will take place in the Northern fleet in the arctic ocean.... not somewhere easy for geostationary orbit satellites to observe.

Note if you have a satellite dish then you are using a geostationary satellite... it goes around the equator at an altitude where it takes one day to go around the earth... meaning it effectively hovers in the air so you can point a fixed satellite dish at it and not have to move the dish to follow the satellite.

Optical reconnaissance satellites are usually operated between ~500 and ~2000 km and circle the earth numerous times a day. They can also be placed at any desired inclination to cover any territory.

The thing is, their orbit is precisely known to everyone and thus any activity can be scheduled to avoid them. They are best used to snoop on stationery assets.

mnztr wrote:

Daniel_Admassu wrote:Optical reconnaissance satellites are usually operated between ~500 and ~2000 km and circle the earth numerous times a day. They can also be placed at any desired inclination to cover any territory.

The thing is, their orbit is precisely known to everyone and thus any activity can be scheduled to avoid them. They are best used to snoop on stationery assets.

They do have satellites that can manuver, but repositioning uses a LOT of fuel and there are only so many cycles they can do. Its crazy expensive for each reposition. But I think in this case the Russians will want the US to monitor the test and show that it works...if it does. The Russians also played a lot of games with decoys and repositioning of assets to cause the USA to inflate their estimates in the past.

Satellites are not usually repositioned in orbit. The gravitational and angular momentum gradient is too steep for that. They are just put in an initial inclination by the carrier vehicle and they stay that way. What little propellant (like hydrazine) they carry is used to correct attitude errors and altitude loss due to trace atmosphere and solar wind pressure over its lifetime.

But the advantage of an inclined orbit with respect to the equator is, since the earth rotates on its axis, the orbit traces a kind of helical rotating path over its sphere. This allows for surveillance of potentially the whole globe.

It also creates a predictable timetable for when the satellite will be able to see things in a specific area.

If you are interested in such things there is a website called Heavens Above, which tracks all sorts of satellites.

www.heavens-above.com

Click on the above link and then on the left hand side under configuration and below login it has a link to set your location.

Click on that and use whatever method to specify your location and it and then on the main page again in the section titled Satellites under the title 10 day predictions for satellites of special interest... click on the ISS link and it will generate a 10 day chart for your location to observe the international space station as it flys over your location.

The ISS is at about 350km altitude and orbits earth every 90 minutes, but depending on its flight path it might not go over your location in the next ten days.

Note it shows visible passes so the sun needs to be shining on the ISS for it to be included in the list... it might pass your location early morning or late at night but it wont be both. Sometimes it will be visible twice on one day normally the same night or the same morning.

At the top of the chart is the option to show all passes or just the visible ones... for observation the visible ones are the only ones worth bothering with.

The columns for the chart are from left to right the day and then the brightness... note the lower the number the brighter it is... so minus 3.7 is much brighter than 0.4 or something. A full moon is something like minus 6, so minus 3.7 is a very bright venus type view.

There are then three big columns... start, highest point, and end. Start is obviously when the station will become visible and it shows the time, direction and altitude from the horizon you should be looking to see it appear. I normally ignore the highest point, the end column shows the time and direction and altitude above the horizon when the station will enter shadow and no longer be visible.

Depending on the angles and where you are it can be visible for up to 6 minutes at a time, but could easily not be visible at all as it passes over.

On the main page of the site there is an image showing the location of the ISS over planet earth... it of course goes over during day time but it is not visible.

The source announced the imminent start of state tests of Zircon missiles.

MOSCOW, July 10-RIA Novosti. State tests of hypersonic missiles "Zircon" will begin before the end of July, a source in the military-industrial complex told RIA Novosti.

"As part of the launching state tests of the ship's missile system with the Zircon hypersonic missile, ground and sea targets will be fired from the Admiral Gorshkov frigate,"he said.
This shooting will be the first launch of the Zircon this year and the fourth - from the Admiral Gorshkov for all time.
Last year, according to the Defense Ministry, the frigate performed three missile launches: two at sea targets and one at a ground target.
It is planned to complete the tests this year.

https://ria.ru/20210710/tsirkon-1740694367.html

State tests of the Zircon hypersonic missile to begin in August

In the second half of August, flight design tests of the Zircon will begin from the Severodvinsk nuclear submarine, a TASS source in the military-industrial complex said.

MOSCOW, July 18. / TASS /. State tests of the newest Zircon hypersonic missile from a surface launch vehicle will begin in August 2021. This was reported to TASS by a source in the military-industrial complex.

"The first launch of Zircon within the framework of state tests from the frigate Admiral of the Soviet Union Fleet Gorshkov of the Northern Fleet is planned to be performed in the first half of August. In the second half of August, flight design tests of the Zircon will begin from the nuclear submarine Severodvinsk," he said. , having specified that earlier it was in the first case about May-June.

As noted by the source, "Severodvinsk" will carry out the first test launch of "Zircon" from the surface position, but in both cases it is supposed to hit surface targets. According to another TASS source, in total, within the framework of state tests of the Zircon, four launches are to be performed from the Admiral Gorshkov. NPO Mashinostroyenia (part of the Tactical Missile Armament Corporation), where the Zircons were developed and produced, did not comment on this information.

https://tass.ru/armiya-i-opk/11928483

This is the real "Checkmate"

No way this is Onyx with that flight profile.

All the naysayers saying it was Onyx launch should should eat crow(flamming and Arrow), Zircon just uses the same launch and aiming system with the blow-off aiming cap.

How did you embbed the twit in your post ? It wasn't possible till now.

No way this is Onyx with that flight profile.

All the naysayers saying it was Onyx launch should should eat crow(flamming and Arrow), Zircon just uses the same launch and aiming system with the blow-off aiming cap.

Onyx is very similar to Zircon and would have a similar propulsion set up, the main difference is that it has a scramjet instead of a ramjet which requires different air intakes etc.

The near vertical climb in the video above could be used by Onyx to maximise the height at which it flys to its target, but it would be more useful for Zircon to get as high as possible as quickly as possible.

The missile that leaves the tube looks to be different from Onyx too.... but denial is a place you can get stuck in and it is not healthy at all really...

How did you embbed the twit in your post ? It wasn't possible till now.

The new button next to the Youtube button that says "embed content".

In the close-up you can see the top of the missile necks in significantly before bulging at the tip where the boost tipper thing is, definitely more than P-800/Onyx does


compare with an Onyx which is essentially parallel sided all the way up


In the wide shot you can see there is a booster then some form of wings at the base of the main missile about where the tail fins of Onyx are, again clear narrowing below the boost tipper thing


After the boost tipper thing separates there does look like a truncated triangular & asymmetrical tip consistent with a waverider body & it persists in looking like that over a bunch of frames, never really looks like a symmetrical cone



I'd semi-convinced myself that it must be either a developed Onyx or an Iskander/Kinzhal built with a booster body compliant with the narrower UKSK max diameter but with that asymmetric tip its looking hard to see as anything but the air-breathing waverider its generally been rumored to be.

It's a scramjet. What were you expecting but a pointy nose ?

PapaDragon wrote:

Isos wrote:It's a scramjet. What were you expecting but a pointy nose ?

It's called humour

Look it up

Yeah I though your first sentence was a quote of someone else saying it seriously and answered. I had a bug it seems.

I undersrood your image was humour .

Seems like Tzirkon is ready.

Jack Detsch
@JackDetsch
Pentagon spokes John Kirby calls Russian test of a nuclear-capable Zircon hypersonic missile "destabilizing."

"You'd have to ask Vladimir Putin why he's chosen to go that route."

Isos wrote:Seems like Tzirkon is ready.

Jack Detsch
@JackDetsch
Pentagon spokes John Kirby calls Russian test of a nuclear-capable Zircon hypersonic missile "destabilizing."

"You'd have to ask Vladimir Putin why he's chosen to go that route."

Hahaha is this a joke?

America is in its essence is destabilizing. These yaps should just shut the fcuk up.

How dare those Russian snow-ni**ers give us a hard time in our attempts to turn them into our serfs in our colony.

So where are the deployed US equivalents? Or is the fig leaf story that the US doesn't need such systems and is
not about "destabilization".

Burevesnik is unlikely to be used against them contrary to Tzirkon. And they can't counter it.

Their biggest fear is to see it exported.

It's a scramjet. What were you expecting but a pointy nose ?

As far as I'm aware while its been copiously rumored to be a scramjet its never been officially stated as such.

A lot of people assumed that Kinzhal would be a scramjet too but it turned out to be 'just' an airlaunched Iskander so I've been working on the assumption that its not necessarily what everyone else assumed.