Russia Tests Nuclear-Powered Burevestnik Missile

Vladimir Putin claims Russia has test-launched a new nuclear-powered missile dubbed the “Flying Chernobyl” – and has vowed it will soon be ready for war.

The Russian president said his menacing 9M730 Burevestnik missile – assigned the codename “Skyfall” by Nato – was a “weapon of unlimited range powered by a nuclear engine”.

Putin’s long-touted super weapon will be met by scepticism in the West – with the missile’s development history previously blighted by failures and delays.

The “Skyfall” missile was previously described by top State Department official Thomas Countryman as a “uniquely stupid weapon system”.

He called the Burevestnik a “flying Chernobyl that poses more threat to Russia than it does to other countries” due to its deadly radioactive trail.

But the latest supposedly successful missile launch saw it travel for 14,000km for 15 hours, top Russian army general Valery Gerasimov said.

Putin also boasted his new weapon was “invincible” in the face of current and future missile defence systems.

Dubbed SSC-X-9 Skyfall by Nato, the Burevestnik missile is about 12 metres long and carries a thermonuclear warhead.

It was first unveiled in 2018 – and was one of six Russia “super weapons” hailed by Putin.

Its sister projects included the Satan 2 – or Sarmat – nuclear missile, the Zircon, Avangard and Kinzhal hypersonic weapons, and the Poseidon submarine nuclear drone.

Experts have cast doubt over its realistic capabilities and little is publicly known about its technical details.

The Burevestnik, before the latest launch, had a poor record of at least 13 known tests with only two partial successes since 2016, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI).

The bungling setbacks include an unexpected 2019 blast during a botched recovery following a prototype crash, State Department records say.

But the Burevestnik is now in its last stage of development before it will deployed to the frontlines, Putin said on Sunday.

The Russian despot made the bombshell announcement during a visit to a command post of the Russian army.

He said: “It is a truly unique system – one that no other country in the world possesses.”

The test launch reportedly took place earlier in the week before it was announced this weekend.

Last year, satellite images showed the top secret launch site of Putin’s feared “Skyfall” nukes.

A pair of US researchers spotted the deployment site in Vologoda.

Putin has previously labelled it “a radically new type of weaponry” with “unlimited range and unlimited ability to manoeuvre”.

Burevestnik – meaning “storm petrel” in Russian – was described by US military authorities in 2021 as a “unique weapon with intercontinental-range capability”.

It is designed to carry a nuclear warhead, while a built-in mini-size nuclear reactor supposedly provides a range far longer than any previous non-ballistic cruise missiles.

The nuclear energy core in theory could let it fly around the world several times before hitting its target.

It can also follow a flat flight path at extremely low altitudes, making it “invisible” as it flies below the range of most missile detection systems.

It comes after another huge bombardment on Ukrainian cities over Saturday night.

Kyiv officials said 26 people had been injured, including six children, in overnight attacks on the capital.

Three people died and 29 were injured across the country according to Ukrainian state services.

Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia launched 1,200 drones, 1,360 bombs and 50 missiles against Ukraine this week.