An intercontinental nuclear missile causes an explosion on a Russian military base
A fire broke out at the Russian nuclear missile launching site in Plesetsk between September 19 and 20, apparently during a test of an intercontinental missile. The FRANCE 24 Observers team spoke to analysts who told us just how dangerous such an incident could be.
Satellite images widely shared online appear to show that Russia suffered a “catastrophic failure” in a test of the nuclear missile Sarmat. The missile, also called RS-28, has a range of nearly 15,000 kilometres, and can carry about fifteen nuclear warheads.
On September 20, NASA satellites used to track and locate wildfires detected an usual source of heat in northern Russia. The three red dots that appeared on these images indicate the start of a fire. The next day, the dots were still visible in images of the same area.
Ominously, the red points on the NASA images were located right on a launch site for Russian missiles in Plesetsk, meaning that a fire had almost certainly taken place at this highly sensitive site.
Flames appear in images recorded on September 20 by satellites from the Sentinel mission.
The scale of the damage caused by this fire appears in better quality satellite images recorded by the company Maxar.
These satellite images were posted on social media just a few hours after they were recorded. That’s because many analysts and investigators were already keeping a close eye on the region.
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An incident soon after ignition
