Ukraine hits Russian heavy rocket launcher near Black Sea coast

Ukrainian drones have destroyed a Russian 9K515 Tornado-S heavy multiple launch rocket system in occupied Kherson Oblast, hitting the launcher with several different kamikaze drones in succession in a strike carried out by the Prymary unit of Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (HUR), which released the footage on Oct. 20.

OSINT analyst Dominik geolocated the strike to the village of Ulyanivka just outside Skadovsk, at coordinates 46.189524, 32.964916, which places the launcher close to the Black Sea coast and well behind the Dnipro River front line.

The video shows the Tornado-S being struck by drones of different types one after another, a method Ukrainian operators use against high-value vehicles so that a second or third drone can finish off a target that survives the first hit before the crew can drive it away. HUR did not give the exact date of the strike, saying only that it took place over the past month, and Russia has not commented on the loss.

The Tornado-S is one of the most valuable launchers in Russia’s rocket artillery, since it is a modernized version of the Soviet 9A52 Smerch that fires 300 mm (11.8-inch) rockets from a 12-tube launcher mounted on an eight-wheeled Kamaz truck. Built by NPO Splav in Tula, part of the state-owned Rostec group, the system uses digital fire control and GLONASS satellite navigation so its three-person crew can prepare and fire a full salvo without leaving the cab, and its guided rockets can reach targets up to 120 km (75 miles) away.

That range lets Russian crews fire on Ukrainian cities from deep inside occupied territory, and in the south the system has repeatedly been used against Kherson and other towns along the Dnipro from positions in the occupied part of the region. Ukrainian units put a high price on each launcher they destroy, and after a drone strike on a Tornado-S in the Huliaipole sector in July, the Pomsta Border Guard Brigade estimated the vehicle’s value at more than $15 million.

The Skadovsk strike is the latest in a series of Tornado-S losses this year as Ukrainian drones reach further behind Russian lines. In February, the Ptahi unit of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces destroyed a launcher in occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast with FP-2 strike drones guided by reconnaissance drones, we reported at the time, and in March a long-range Fire Point drone hit three Tornado-S launchers and a transport-loader near Karakul in occupied Crimea, as we reported. Two more launchers were hit near Melitopol within a few days in late April, followed by the July strike in the Huliaipole sector.

“Big names, formidable specifications and the millions invested in military equipment do not guarantee the occupiers’ immunity,” Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence said in its statement.

The Tornado-S was the centerpiece of a wider monthly report from Prymary, which HUR said also hit a Buk-M3 air defense system, an Orion reconnaissance and strike drone, a Kasta-2E low-altitude radar, a Nebo-U long-range surveillance radar and two P-18 early warning radars. The unit also struck a drone assembly and repair site and a building housing troops of the 4th Air Assault Battalion of the 108th Air Assault Regiment, although HUR gave no dates or locations for those strikes and did not say whether every target was destroyed or only damaged.