Russian 3M22 Tsirkon Hypersonic Missile

745ezdtruj.png

I would venture to suggest that the GZUR missile is represented in the image.
(I write through a translator; I speak English quite poorly).
 
Yes, its most probably GZUR(Giperzvukovaya Upravlyaemaya Raketa / Hypersonic Guided Missile) developed by former "Raduga" design bureau(part of KTRV now). 6 meters, 1500kg, 1500km, 6M. Possibly intended as antiship missile for Tu-22M3M.
 
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Yes, its most probably GZUR(Giperzvukovaya Upravlyaemaya Raketa / Hypersonic Guided Missile) developed by former "Raduga" design bureau(part of KTRV now). 6 meters, 1500kg, 1500km, 6M. Possibly intended as antiship missile for Tu-22M3M.
Recently, flight-tests of a new hypersonic missile for the Tu-22M3M were conducted.
11.05.2020
 
The GZUR Probably can deserve its own thread now.

So basically Russia is keeping up with tradition where NPO Mashinostroyenia handles the surface to surface weapons (The Zircon) while Raduga handles the Air to Surface weapons (GZUR).
 
So what is that image of? Is it of an actual in-development missile project? Does it have a precise designation?
Surely, even if not directly Tsirkon related, underlying principle of the missile seems to be similar and perhaps some basic development was shared between missile-makers?
 
So, what's the question?

Totoro wonders what kind of rocket is shown in the picture above. GZUR is, or not GZUR. Or in general, the work of "girls of designers", which has nothing to do with reality at all.
 
Does it have a precise designation?

Perhaps this link will help you, it has almost exhaustive information.
This aviation hypersonic missile with a range of 1,500 km. But not the fact that it is designed to fight ships.
GZUR-hypersonic guided missile.

 

First footage of the real thing? Not that it is very revealing if true, and it's possible that Oniks is shown at least in the launch close-up.

However, I would caution that the X-51ski configuration commonly associated with Tsirkon in the press may well be speculative, so the fact that it doesn't look like that doesn't necessarily mean we're seeing something else. Similarly, an intake cover with tip-over thrusters makes sense in a VLS-launched hypersonic airbreather for all the same reasons why it is present on Oniks - doesn't mean it's actually an Oniks.

Notably, the missile does not tilt over through 90° after launch like Oniks typically does - this would make sense for a missile claimed to have traveled at Mach 8 out to 450km (you're not going to do either, let alone in combination, at wave top height). Then again, Oniks obviously can fly high-altitude profiles as well... this is shaping up to be a bit of a 53T6 tease story :( Hope it doesn't take 30 years before we get clear close-up photos!

EDIT: Another report additionally gives an altitude of 28km and a flight time of 4.5 minutes. That works out to an average of 1.67km/s or Mach 5.7 at that height on a cold day - the peak speed would obviously be higher than this, so something approaching Mach 8 is at least somewhat plausible.
 
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So if it's Zircon. Then yeah, it's just as big as Oniks. some others already speculated much bigger missile but it's also known that it would be launched from UKSK so it is not possible for it to be bigger than UKSK cells.
 
Does it have a dual combustion ramjet / scramjet? Doesn't look to be going particularly fast at booster burnout. :confused:
 
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First stage obviously has solid fuel engine and ascensional rate, as can be clearly seen in last video, is not much less than modern Russian SAM's. Configuration of second stage will not be known soon i suppose.
 
. Configuration of second stage will not be known soon i suppose.
The second stage is probably a scramjet engine? In 29 seconds the video shows the second stage drive? Looks like a rocket engine second stage, or is a scramjet streak that disappears momentarily?
 
Found this news at another forum. Источник: с "Адмирала Горшкова" проведут залповый пуск "Цирконов" - РИА Новости, 04.01.2021 (ria.ru)

Source: from the Admiral Gorshkov will conduct a salvo launch of" Zircons"."

"MOSCOW, January 4-RIA Novosti. The frigate of the Northern fleet project 22350 "Admiral Gorshkov" until the end of 2021 for the first time will perform a salvo launch of hypersonic missiles "Zircon" on tests, a source in the military-industrial complex told RIA Novosti.

As reported by the Ministry of defense, in 2020, Gorshkov performed three launches of Zircons: two-at sea targets and one-at a ground target. In all cases, only one missile was fired.

"According to the plan of state tests of the missile system, by the end of 2021, the first salvo firing of several Zircon missiles will be performed from the Admiral Gorshkov frigate. The missiles will be launched from the ship with an interval of several seconds, " the source told RIA Novosti.
He explained that the salvo firing "is designed to provide not only missile tests, but also to test the capabilities of the ship's weapons control system, in particular, when it performs tasks with a massive missile strike simultaneously on sea and land targets."

The launches will be carried out in an environment of powerful electronic countermeasures. According to the source, the Zircon is equipped with a unique homing system in terms of noise immunity characteristics, and they want to confirm its capabilities during tests.
The zircon is the world's first hypersonic cruise missile capable of performing long – term aerodynamic flight with maneuvering in dense layers of the atmosphere, using its own engine thrust throughout the route, while its speed reaches about nine speeds of sound, and the maximum firing range is up to a thousand kilometers. The complex can hit both surface and ground targets with the same efficiency.

Serial deliveries of hypersonic missiles "Zircon" for the Russian Navy should begin in 2022."
 
Found this news at another forum. Источник: с "Адмирала Горшкова" проведут залповый пуск "Цирконов" - РИА Новости, 04.01.2021 (ria.ru)

Source: from the Admiral Gorshkov will conduct a salvo launch of" Zircons"."

"MOSCOW, January 4-RIA Novosti. The frigate of the Northern fleet project 22350 "Admiral Gorshkov" until the end of 2021 for the first time will perform a salvo launch of hypersonic missiles "Zircon" on tests, a source in the military-industrial complex told RIA Novosti.

As reported by the Ministry of defense, in 2020, Gorshkov performed three launches of Zircons: two-at sea targets and one-at a ground target. In all cases, only one missile was fired.

"According to the plan of state tests of the missile system, by the end of 2021, the first salvo firing of several Zircon missiles will be performed from the Admiral Gorshkov frigate. The missiles will be launched from the ship with an interval of several seconds, " the source told RIA Novosti.
He explained that the salvo firing "is designed to provide not only missile tests, but also to test the capabilities of the ship's weapons control system, in particular, when it performs tasks with a massive missile strike simultaneously on sea and land targets."

The launches will be carried out in an environment of powerful electronic countermeasures. According to the source, the Zircon is equipped with a unique homing system in terms of noise immunity characteristics, and they want to confirm its capabilities during tests.
The zircon is the world's first hypersonic cruise missile capable of performing long – term aerodynamic flight with maneuvering in dense layers of the atmosphere, using its own engine thrust throughout the route, while its speed reaches about nine speeds of sound, and the maximum firing range is up to a thousand kilometers. The complex can hit both surface and ground targets with the same efficiency.

Serial deliveries of hypersonic missiles "Zircon" for the Russian Navy should begin in 2022."
Wish they'd release some good video. :(
 
Wish they'd release some good video.
They really are persistent on not wanting to show scramjet missiles, such as the GZUR being talked about in 2013 and they do not want to show a visual representation of it even when it was claimed to be test launched in May 2020. The U.S. approaches it the opposite way of showing the model of a HAWC missile, but do not give weight or length characteristics of the missile other than being bigger than the F-35's weapon's bay.
 
Is there a model of the HAWC? I know the manufacturer had some artist's impression pics, but I didn't think there was any public model.
 
Is there a model of the HAWC? I know the manufacturer had some artist's impression pics, but I didn't think there was any public model.
Yeah just a visual representation of the missile(at least by lockheed martin), but no visual representation or model offered by Russia of either known scramjet missile. They do have a tendency to sometimes reveal certain missile projects later after they have been tested and sometimes revealing missile projects and than having to still work on them. Such as the mysterious black missile that was randomly shown time and time again on the Mig-31 as a proposed ASAT weapon, but what I found disappointing is that its name was called Burevestnik(finally it was given a name recently) even though that name was already given to another ongoing missile project.
 
underwater zircon trans.PNG

Путин: Россия работает над "противоядием" от будущего гиперзвукового оружия других стран - Армия и ОПК - ТАСС (tass.ru)

"The first shooting of the hypersonic cruise missile "Circon" from the frigate "Admiral Gorshkov" was carried out in early October. Then the ship launched a missile from the White Sea, it hit a sea target in the Barents Sea. The highest speed of the "Circon" was 8 speeds of sound, the altitude of the flight reached 28 km. After that shooting was performed in November. At that time, Circon successfully hit a naval target at a distance of 450 km.

Also on December 11, the frigate "Admiral Gorshkov" performed a successful firing from the White Sea hypersonic missile "Circon" on the test site in the Arkhangelsk region (successfully hit the coastal target at a distance of more than 350 km, flight speed - more than 8 M).

In his message to the Federal Assembly in February 2019, Russian President Vladimir Putin noted that the "Circon" missile is capable of reaching a speed of about 9 M and will be able to hit both surface and ground targets at a distance of more than 1,000 km."

Garmony / Harmony - RUSOSUS (globalsecurity.org)
No idea if this network is only limited to arctic region (instead of being put covertly elsewhere with Belgorod). But this might also help expand the underwater network to build a better kill chain.

Россия планирует создать сетецентрическую систему военного назначения с использованием АНПА – Telegraph
In the journal "Communication Technology" published by PJSC "Inteltech" (No. 1 (145) - 2019 and No. 3 (147) - 2019: http://www.inteltech.ru/) interesting pictures were discovered with the concept of building a transport network for a united digital automated communication system of the RF Armed Forces - OACSS of the RF Armed Forces, as well as proposals for expanding OACSS with MRTK control components - marine robotic complexes. In the second scheme, a space segment based on the Gonets spacecraft is allocated, which is planned to be made part of the Sphere system. It is also proposed to deploy an additional communications center on Novaya Zemlya to control the MRTK, Alexey Ramm and Dmitry Kornev previously wrote about this object (http://izvestia.ru/news/647107#ixzz4XHWubUuw). Probably, the scheme of the proposal for the MRTK management system represents one of the proposals within the framework of the "Harmony" theme. It is also proposed to use hydroacoustic communication channels to control the MRTK,including through sonar buoys (GAB) and through AUV-repeaters. It can be assumed that the underwater vehicle marked on the diagram as AUV is an AUV developed under the code “Harmony-Guide”, and “GAB” "is a hydroacoustic buoy under the code“ Harmony-Pebble. ”Of particular interest is the underwater vehicle designated on the diagram as MRTK , it is possible that the authors of the scheme meant MRTK "Poseidon" and "Cephalopod".

underwater network 1.JPG


underwater network 2.JPG
 
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@tequilashooter Could you try to post images as jpg if possible and thumbnails rather than full size?

There are people using dialup to access the forum and large embedded images prevent them viewing topics easily.
 
@tequilashooter Could you try to post images as jpg if possible and thumbnails rather than full size?

There are people using dialup to access the forum and large embedded images prevent them viewing topics easily.
jpg got it, and what sizes would you recommend because looking at the Su-57 RCS thread images, lets just say there are some that like to spam more images than I do(with questionable sizes). I will see if I can edit it now thanks.

Edit(all done boss) Anything else let me know. ;)
 
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skimmed through some pages here and realize that this news was not included and that is the missile can be fired from underwater.

Гиперзвуковой «Циркон» запустят с борта АПЛ «Северодвинск» (topwar.ru)

"As part of the ongoing state tests of the ship's missile system "Circon" planned firing hypersonic missile from the underwater position from the submarine "Severodvinsk"

I never knew that because I thought these missiles can only be launched on ships or on submarines that are afloat (instead of underwater). So I am guessing that if there did exist some coastal mainland with ground capabilities to intercept 10,000 ICBMs, and with the satellite capabilities to track HGV and scramjets. The 1st attack would be done by the Zircons and than the Bulavas? I heard that some submarines can get very close to a coastal mainland and I guess once a barrage of these get fired they will not be high up like ballistic missiles but rather closer to the earth which makes it seem that if somehow intercepted its a rather even if you still win you lose situation. Heard starfish prime screwed up a lot of electronics and that a nuclear detonation can also cause a radar blackout(for some set of time which is precious) which can mask other missiles coming from behind it to go deeper and deeper. Although these missiles have a range limit I assume they are used in a nuclear strike to pave enough way for bulavas to take care of the rest. I am guessing this is the procedure they would do when nukes start flying? I guess they have a reason for having a lot submarine projects with different tasks.
 
Ejecting a missile while submerged isn't particularly new; it never would have occurred to me that Zircon couldn't be launched that way. Isn't every other Russian cruise missile launched submerged going back to the SSN-9 Siren/Charlie class? (Forgot the Russian designation).
 

MOSCOW, February 26 - RIA Novosti. The Severodvinsk Project 885 (Ash) multipurpose nuclear submarine this year will be the first Russian submarine to fire Zircon hypersonic missiles, including from under water, a source in the military-industrial complex told RIA Novosti.

By the end of this year, the Severodvinsk submarine will carry out at least one Zircon launch from the surface position and at least one from the underwater one. as part of surface and underwater carriers, "- said the agency's interlocutor.

He added that earlier Zircon firing from submersible stands simulating launches from submarines from a submerged position had been performed.
 
Ejecting a missile while submerged isn't particularly new; it never would have occurred to me that Zircon couldn't be launched that way. Isn't every other Russian cruise missile launched submerged going back to the SSN-9 Siren/Charlie class? (Forgot the Russian designation).
Harpoon, and a couple others, ride in a canister to the surface.

msl_ssm_harpoon_v3.jpg
 

MOSCOW, March 4. /TASS/. A Tsirkon hypersonic missile will be test-launched from an underwater carrier for the first time no sooner than June, a high-placed source in the domestic defense industry told TASS on Thursday.

"The Tsirkon may be test-launched for the first time from the [Northern Fleet’s nuclear-powered submarine] Severodvinsk in June as the earliest date. There is no exact date for the start of trials so far," he said.

Another source earlier told TASS that the program of the Tsirkon’s flight development tests had been implemented successfully and in full in 2020, with three launches conducted from the frigate Admiral Gorshkov: two against sea targets and one against a ground target.

According to the source’s data, the Tsirkon will boast an operating range of about 1,500 km to strike ground targets and slightly less to hit naval targets. The Tsirkon hypersonic missile was earlier planned to be accepted for service in 2023.
 

"MOSCOW, March 25. / TASS /. Flight design tests (LKI) of the Zircon hypersonic missile from the surface carrier - the frigate "Admiral of the Soviet Union Fleet Gorshkov" of the Northern Fleet - have been successfully completed, and state tests will begin in the near future. This was reported to TASS by a source in the military-industrial complex.

"LKI" Zircon "with the use of the frigate" Admiral Gorshkov "have been successfully completed. Four launches have been made. All missiles hit the" peg "(the center of the conditional circle into which the rocket should hit)," he said. According to him, the state tests of the Zircon from the frigate will begin approximately in May-June. "There will be several launches," he added.

Speaking about the upcoming tests of the Zircon from the submarine carrier - the nuclear submarine Severodvinsk - the interlocutor of the agency noted that at least two launches are planned for this year within the framework of LKI, and state tests will be carried out in 2022 with the subsequent adoption of the rocket for weapons."
 

"The fifth submarine of the Yasen-M project will receive the first state-of-the-art missile system. Submarines of the Yasen-M project will be routinely equipped with the Zircon hypersonic missile system, starting with the Perm nuclear submarine. This is the fifth submarine of the Yasen-M project in a series. The decision was made by the Ministry of Defense, it follows from the documents on the construction time available to Izvestia. "Perm", which received serial number 165 when it was laid, began to be built in 2016. But it has not yet been launched into the water. The four already built Yasen will receive these weapons at a later date."
 

The minister mentioned "Zircon" when he announced plans to test new weapons, which will take place before the end of this year in the North navy... According to Shoigu, a total of 79 samples of military equipment are planned to be tested, including 13 ships and vessels, as well as 4 nuclear submarines.

The head of the Ministry of Defense confirmed that the hypersonic "Zircon" will go into service with nuclear submarines and surface ships of the far sea zone. The minister did not say anything about the start of serial deliveries.

Earlier it became known that the state tests of "Zircon" will begin in early summer and will take place in parallel with the surface and underwater carriers. Flight design tests of the rocket from a surface launch vehicle were completed last year.

In early March, data appeared that the Ministry of Defense intends to accelerate the Zircon test program with the aim of adopting the missile into service in the first half of 2022. The frigate "Admiral Gorshkov" and the multipurpose submarine of project 885 (code "Ash") "Severodvinsk" will take part in the tests.

The first official submarine carrier of the Zircons, according to sources in the defense industry complex, will be the Project 885M Yasen-M nuclear submarine Perm.


It operates two types of satellites — Pion and Lotos. There is actually no information about them in open sources. However, modern technologies prompt the missions and capabilities of the spacecraft.

Liana satellites survey the sea theater of warfare and detect hostile warships and submarines. The intelligence provides data on military activities of foreign countries in various parts of the globe. Test ranges, airfields, naval bases, nuclear missile infrastructure, strategic enterprises, groupings of warships and ground forces trigger most interest. Experts said Liana does not depend on the atmospheric conditions and provides coordinates with a 1-km to 10-m precision.

Open sources said the satellites operate in a circular orbit of 800-900 km. It makes them invulnerable to antisatellite weapons. The operation in the top limits of low-altitude orbit helps monitor hostile actions at sea and on the ground and coordinate actions of friendly forces. The system provides guidance for Kalibr cruise missiles, as well as air ballistic Kinzhal and hypersonic Tsirkon. The latter specifically needs precise guidance, as the speed exceeds Mach 8 and radically decreases the fly-in time.

In early 2000s, such capabilities of the Russian space system seemed impossible. New technologies raised the level of space hardware to ensure the balance of forces in the current international situation.
 

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