Russia says ammunition blast badly damages major ship in Black Sea fleet - Interfax
The flagship of Russia's Black Sea fleet, the Moskva missile cruiser, was badly damaged when ammunition on board blew up, Interfax news agency quoted the defence ministry as saying on Thursday.
Interfax said the crew had been evacuated. It blamed the blast on a fire and said the cause was being investigated.
A Ukrainian official earlier said the Moskva had been hit by two missiles but did not give any evidence.
The 12,500 tonne ship has a crew of around 500. Russian news agencies said the Moskva was armed with 16 anti-ship "Vulkan" cruise missiles, which have a range of at least 700 km (440 miles).
"As the result of a fire on the Moskva missile cruiser, ammunition detonated. The ship was seriously damaged," the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. "The crew was completely evacuated."
Interfax did not give more details.
Maksym Marchenko, governor of the region around the Black Sea port of Odesa, earlier said in an online post that two anti-ship missiles had hit the cruiser, but did not provide evidence.
Last month Ukraine said it had destroyed a large Russian landing support ship, the Orsk, on the smaller Sea of Azov to the northeast of the Black Sea. Moscow has not commented on what had happened to the ship.
The flagship of Russia's Black Sea fleet, the Moskva missile cruiser, was badly damaged when ammunition on board blew up, Interfax news agency quoted the defence ministry as saying on Thursday.
www.reuters.com
The Russian Cruiser ‘Moskva’ Dominates The Black Sea
The Russian navy cruiser
Moskva by far is the most powerful warship in the Black Sea. If Russian President Vladimir Putin orders his troops to widen their war in Ukraine,
Moskva, the flagship of
the Black Sea Fleet, undoubtedly would lead the naval assault.
Think of
Moskva as a 12,500-ton, 612-foot mobile missile battery with nearly 500 people aboard. She packs enough anti-ship missiles to wipe out the entire Ukrainian navy and enough air-defense missiles to swat away any conceivable aerial attack on the Black Sea Fleet’s amphibious flotilla.
Moskva’s value to a Ukraine operation could make her a top target of Ukraine’s missileers. Assuming the Ukrainians can preserve their anti-ship missiles through Russian bombardment
and pinpoint
Moskva’s location using radars or drones, they might get to take a few shots at the cruiser.
She packs 16 fixed launchers for P-1000 anti-ship missiles with a range of 300 miles, vertical tubes for 64 S-300 air-defense missiles with a range of 56 miles, rail launchers for 40 Osa missiles for aerial self-defense plus a bevy of guns—twin 130-millimeter guns that can hit targets 15 miles away plus self-defense guns. Torpedo tubes and a helicopter round out her capabilities.
The cruiser’s sensors make her self-sufficient as a missile battery. The ship’s Top Pair and Top Steer radars can peer out to 200 miles or farther.
Moskva led the Russian navy’s seaborne assault on the Republic of Georgia back in 2008, protecting three amphibious ships that landed a battalion or two of naval infantry.
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, the cruiser held station off Donuzlav Bay, bottling up the Ukrainian warships there. In 2015 she deployed to the Syrian coast in order to protect Russian troops from possible air and sea attacks.
Aging and reportedly vulnerable to fire,
Moskva in 2016 sailed back to Sevastopol in Crimea for a three-year overhaul. She emerged with P-1000 anti-ship missiles in place of her older P-500s. The overhaul extends her service life by a decade or so.
Moskva’s sensors and weapons have kept her relevant, even as the Russian navy in recent decades mostly has abandoned Soviet doctrine. Today the Russian navy combines oceangoing submarines with a modest surface force that steadily is replacing big, high-endurance ships with small, short-endurance ones. Those small ships—frigates and corvettes—retain a long-range strike capability in the form of Kalibr cruise missiles.
Moskva is not a Kalibr-carrier. But she can
protect the Kalibr-carriers—and other ships—as she sweeps the surrounding sea and air of enemy ships and planes. Aside from
Moskva, the Black Sea Fleet operates 10 frigates and corvettes, six diesel-electric submarines and 10 or 11 amphibious ships and boats.
In the likeliest Ukraine scenarios, the corvettes and submarines will lob Kalibrs at targets on land while the amphibs, sailing inside the protective umbrella of
Moskva’s missiles, land a couple battalions as part of a possible wider effort to seize Ukrainian ports such as Odessa.
The Ukrainian fleet is powerless to resist. It has no submarines. And its sole major surface combatant,
the frigate Hetman Sahaydachniy, lacks major weaponry. The Ukrainian air force retreated from separatist-controlled Donbas in 2015 and since then hasn’t played any major role in Ukraine’s defense.
The only Ukrainian forces that might have any realistic shot at
Moskva are the new
Neptune anti-ship missile batteries. The stealthy, radar-guided Neptune can strike ships as far away as 175 miles. Kiev has bought Turkish-made TB-2 drones and American-made radars that can spot targets for the Neptunes.
It’s not clear how many Neptunes it might take to punch through
Moskva’s defenses. Nor is it clear how many Neptunes the Ukrainians possess.
In any event,
Moskva is a big ship and has proved she can take a missile. The Georgian navy reportedly managed to score one hit on the cruiser back in 2008. She spent a year in drydock and was back at sea by 2010.
The Russian navy cruiser Moskva by far is the most powerful warship in the Black Sea. If Russian President Vladimir Putin orders his troops to widen their war in Ukraine, Moskva, the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet, undoubtedly would lead the naval assault.
www.forbes.com
Article from January. I guess we have a little more to go on today. An expensive war exercise, don't you think?
