Ukraine has destroyed one of Russia’s thermobaric flamethrowers, which range in price from $6.5 to $15 million, according to a video shared on Telegram by the Third Assault Brigade.
Members of FATUM unit in the Third Assault Brigade destroyed a Russian TOS-1 Solntsepyok heavy flamethrower system, according to the Ukrainian military publication Militarnyi.
The post on Telegram described Ukraine’s attack as “shooting is fiercer than all action shooters.”
Militarnyi reported that the damage to the flamethrower was likely the result of a previous FPV drone hit and the unit also destroyed numerous Russian vehicles, including trucks transporting personnel and military equipment and UAZ vehicles.
Ukraine’s destruction of one of the TOS-1 Solntsepyoks is significant because defense and military technology expert David Hambling previously told Newsweek that these thermobaric flamethrowers are a “high-priority item” for the Russian military, but Moscow only has a “small number” of them.
Newsweek reached out to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine for comment via email outside of business hours.
A TOS-1 heavy flamethrower system being fired during a training exercise in 2016. Ukraine recently destroyed one of Russia’s TOS-1 Solntsepyok flamethrowers in an attack using an FPV drone.
A TOS-1 heavy flamethrower system being fired during a training exercise in 2016. Ukraine recently destroyed one of Russia’s TOS-1 Solntsepyok flamethrowers in an attack using an FPV drone.
Evgeny Biyatov/Associated Press
The Third Assault Brigade also previously destroyed a Solntsepyok in Kharkiv, in northeast Ukraine, in September and hit it with an FPV drone.
The TOS-1 Solntsepyok, also known as “scorching sunlight,” a rare and expensive thermobaric flamethrower that Russia has been using since the outset of the war, which functions as a multiple launch rocket system and has the ability to fire several dozen thermobaric rocket.
Thermobaric weapons are those that “inflict damage by maximizing the shock wave and overpressure associated with an explosion” and the pressure produced from using these weapons often causes building collapses, ruptured organs, and more according to the Lieber Institute at West Point.
Thermobaric flamethrowers are those that fire incendiary ammunition and their development dates back to the USSR in the 1970s, according to the National Defense University of Ukraine. Thermobaric weapons were also used by U.S. forces in the 1960s.
The TOS-1 has a range of 5.6 miles, can be ready to fire within 90 seconds, and is used to create “incendiary and blast effects” that last longer than conventional explosives.
Russia has been using the TOS-1 Solntsepyok to “attack light armored vehicles, manpower, and to destroy fortifications,” and they have been firing 220 millimeter thermobaric shells.
Ukraine has taken out several Russian thermobaric flamethrowers, including another TOS-1A system in August in the southern Ukrainian Zaporizhzhia region. In this instance, the Security Service of Ukraine, also known as the Sluzhba bezpeky Ukrainy (SBU), used an FPV drone to attack the TOS-1A system.
Ukraine’s SBU has previously described the TOS-1 Solntsepyok as the “pride” of the Russian military complex and a “rare target at the front.”