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Apr 2022
8:33pm, 12 Apr 2022
55,085 posts
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Derby Tup
The Mail story quickly disappeared NE
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Apr 2022
8:53am, 14 Apr 2022
1,489 posts
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Muttley
So Russia admits that its cruiser the Moskva is lost. Big ship -- nearly 200 metres long, crew of 600. The Ukrainians claim they hit it with antiship missiles. I hope that's true but remain sceptical. But something seems to have made the ammo stocks go up.
This is your patch, NE -- any thoughts?
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Apr 2022
9:36am, 14 Apr 2022
24,642 posts
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Angus Clydesdale
Magazines often explode when hit by the opposition's ordnance. The other obvious reasons are sabotage (I think highly unlikely) or muppetry (not impossible, but less likely than the missile option, I think).
I was a wee bit surprised to hear the Russians have admitted to abandoning the ship.
Whichever, it's a bit of a coup given the removal of the bombardment and anti-aircraft capability. Be interesting to see what comes of it.
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Apr 2022
10:13am, 14 Apr 2022
1,087 posts
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fuzzyduck79
Think it has been claimed Ukraine hit the warship with two Neptune missiles, distracting the anti missile capability using a UAV.
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Apr 2022
11:15am, 14 Apr 2022
8,688 posts
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Northern Exile
Yes, this is an interesting situation. When the war kicked off one of the first things I did was look at the Black Sea Fleet's ORBAT* and was mildly surprised to see that this old girl is still in commission. The Moskva is a Slava-class cruiser (it was the first in the class and originally named "Slava") and was around and kicking in my day, it's one of those strange vessels that doesn't really fit in with any Western military doctrine and to all intents and purposes they're obsolete. I forget the Russian class designation, it's possibly a PKR - so Anti-Ship Cruiser, but I could be wrong on that one as it does have a limited ASW capability and the Russians are masters at making the shoe fit, as they say.
For anyone not acquainted with the Russian Navy, they delineate their forces into four separate fleets and the BLKFLT has far less strategic clout than the Northern and Pacific fleets, so tends to be a place where you'd find older and less capable hardware. Unless those SS-N-12 missiles have an offshore capability (which I doubt), then I would hazard a guess that it's been working in a Command and Control capacity, not unlike the old Sverdlov cruisers used to do. But what happened to it? Well, as far as I can tell the vessel has a very limited missile defence capability - certainly those SA-N-6 ain't going to be much use and the ship wouldn't have expected to be attacked by a land-based missile, but that's certainly what's happened here. As Angus said, you only have to hit it in the right place (magazine, fuel tanks, weapon fuel storage etc) and it's going to be fatal, in fact I think the two weapons must have torn the guts out of the thing. The burning question (if you'll excuse the pun) is precisely WHAT hit it. The Ukrainians says it was their own "NEPTUN" missile, but I am sceptical and can't help thinking about other missile variants that have supposedly been delivered to them. You can draw various conclusions, but without further hard evidence it's tough to say.
Whatever, what is now certain is that the Russians are going to be very wary of getting within missle range of the shore. I'll leave you with another interesting thought: To hit this ship the Ukrainians must have had pretty solid intelligence as to its precise position.
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Apr 2022
11:55am, 14 Apr 2022
1,491 posts
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Muttley
You need very precise target coordinates (from a drone?) and sophisticated antiship missiles to take out a vessel that size. The Russians haven't got as far as Odessa yet so maybe the Ukrainians have some coastal missile batteries still intact. If it was them, they clearly retain a decent antiship capability despite the war. I hope it was them 
The Russian MoD admits only to an explosion on board. No word as I can see of casualties. Even on a ship that size, below decks would be a rabbit warren of gangways and flights of steps. Not a place to be when there's a bang and a fire.
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Apr 2022
11:58am, 14 Apr 2022
24,647 posts
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Angus Clydesdale
The 2 things I dreaded most as a firefighter: confined spaces and ships.
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Apr 2022
11:59am, 14 Apr 2022
1,492 posts
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Muttley
Also, it was the Moskva that was famously told "Russian warship, fuck off" by the troops stuck on a Ukrainian island
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Apr 2022
12:01pm, 14 Apr 2022
8,689 posts
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Northern Exile
You need very precise target coordinates (from a drone?) and sophisticated antiship missiles to take out a vessel that size.
A drone is one possibility. I wonder how good their EMCON policy is nowadays??
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Apr 2022
12:33pm, 14 Apr 2022
55,119 posts
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Derby Tup
I thought about the lads on the island. From memory some at least are still around. I hope they’ve heard the news
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