The brand new satellite tv for pc images of some Tu-95s lined with automobile tires and lacking their engines have prompted new theories.
Few days in the past, satellite tv for pc imagery of Engels-2 airbase, positioned in Saratov Oblast, some 400 km southeast of Moscow and roughly 700 km from the border with Ukraine, emerged on-line exhibiting Tu-95 Bear strategic bombers with wings and a small part of the higher fuselage covered with car tires. The explanation for that was not utterly clear.
Based on the Ukrainian sources, the the automobile tires have been used as a type of makeshift safety from assaults carried out with kamikaze drones a principle that we’ve already analysed here.
New hi-rez MAXAR satellite tv for pc imagery published by CNN, offers a better have a look at the tire-laden Tu-95 and Tu-160 bombers, highlighting some fascinating particulars. Upon shut inspection, it seems, the truth is, that one Bear bomber is lacking its left-hand interior engine, whereas one other one doesn’t have propellers put in on its engines. This clearly sparked new theories.
In truth… now that I have a look at the opposite one, it doesn’t have any blades on any of the engines. pic.twitter.com/nyObvlfLcN
— Evergreen Intel (@vcdgf555) September 6, 2023
With the anti-drone makeshift safety principle nonetheless standing, a direct new principle could be the tires getting used as counterweight to compensate for the lacking engine and propellers. Contemplating that there are about 50 tires on the Tu-95 and the bomber’s Kuznetsov NK-12 engine weight being about 3,000 kg, the idea might be legitimate or not, relying if these are actually automobile tires or plane tires and their weight.
Somebody urged the automobile tires have been used as a part of a makeshift safety from assaults carried out with kamikaze drones.
The Warfare Zone speculated it might be a approach to deceive the radar steerage of the Ukrainian Neptune missiles and different long-range missiles that use picture matching for concentrating on, by breaking apart the infrared signature of the focused bombers, a way additionally steadily known as DSMAC (Digital Scene Matching Space Correlator) or ATR (Automated Goal Recognition) when utilized in cruise missiles.
Curiously, it appears to be like just like the presence of the tires has altered the SAR (Artificial Aperture Radar) signatures of the bombers.
@SatimMonitoring has detected uncommon modifications within the TU-95 and TU-160 bomber’s SAR signatures utilizing @umbraspace SAR imagery of the Engels-2 navy base (#Russia). Traits of the captured sign reflections don’t match the plane’s recognized geometry & materials composition pic.twitter.com/3q3beYZ0wQ
— SATIM Inc. (@SatimMonitoring) September 5, 2023
Nevertheless, Engels-2 base, is at the least 600 km (372 miles) from the closest Ukrainian territory, a distance that’s nicely past the vary of the Neptune, believed to be 400 km (250 miles).
No matter, Russia has already proven makes an attempt to deceive satellites and/or missiles goal recognition programs with adopting “misleading camouflage”.
***BREAKING***
New expertise sees by #Russian try to cover ships from #Ukraine utilizing ‘misleading camouflage’
Very fascinating for anybody doing #OSINT, spectacular ship detection / identification algorithms from @SatimMonitoring https://t.co/OJwzEuK9jD
— H I Sutton (@CovertShores) July 12, 2023
The final principle, this one supported additionally by the lacking elements, sees these as decommissioned drones getting used as decoys in case of kamikaze drones’ assaults.
David Cenciotti is a journalist based mostly in Rome, Italy. He’s the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of many world’s most well-known and skim navy aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for main worldwide magazines, together with Air Forces Month-to-month, Fight Plane, and plenty of others, protecting aviation, protection, warfare, business, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown a number of fight planes with totally different air forces. He’s a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Power, a non-public pilot and a graduate in Laptop Engineering. He has written 5 books and contributed to many extra ones.
Stefano D’Urso is a contract journalist and contributor to TheAviationist based mostly in Lecce, Italy. A graduate in Industral Engineering he is additionally finding out to realize a Grasp Diploma in Aerospace Engineering. Digital Warfare, Loitering Munitions and OSINT strategies utilized to the world of navy operations and present conflicts are amongst his areas of experience.
