Moscow Confirms Accomplished Test of Atomic-Propelled Storm Petrel Missile

Russia has tested the nuclear-powered Burevestnik strategic weapon, as stated by the state's top military official.

"We have conducted a multi-hour flight of a nuclear-powered missile and it traveled a 14,000km distance, which is not the limit," Senior Military Leader the commander informed President Vladimir Putin in a broadcast conference.

The terrain-hugging experimental weapon, originally disclosed in 2018, has been portrayed as having a theoretically endless flight path and the ability to evade missile defences.

Western experts have previously cast doubt over the missile's strategic value and Russian claims of having successfully tested it.

The president declared that a "concluding effective evaluation" of the weapon had been held in the previous year, but the statement could not be independently verified. Of over a dozen recorded evaluations, just two instances had partial success since several years ago, based on an disarmament advocacy body.

The general stated the missile was in the sky for fifteen hours during the trial on 21 October.

He explained the weapon's altitude and course adjustments were tested and were confirmed as meeting requirements, according to a domestic media outlet.

"As a result, it displayed superior performance to circumvent defensive networks," the news agency stated the commander as saying.

The missile's utility has been the topic of intense debate in armed forces and security communities since it was initially revealed in 2018.

A previous study by a US Air Force intelligence center concluded: "A nuclear-powered cruise missile would provide the nation a distinctive armament with worldwide reach potential."

However, as an international strategic institute observed the corresponding time, Moscow encounters significant challenges in achieving operational status.

"Its induction into the country's stockpile potentially relies not only on surmounting the considerable technical challenge of ensuring the dependable functioning of the nuclear-propulsion unit," experts noted.

"There occurred several flawed evaluations, and an accident leading to several deaths."

A armed forces periodical referenced in the report states the projectile has a flight distance of between 10,000 and 20,000km, permitting "the missile to be based across the country and still be capable to target targets in the United States mainland."

The same journal also says the projectile can operate as at minimal altitude as 50 to 100 metres above the earth, causing complexity for defensive networks to stop.

The weapon, referred to as Skyfall by an international defence pact, is believed to be driven by a reactor system, which is designed to activate after primary launch mechanisms have launched it into the sky.

An investigation by a media outlet last year identified a facility 295 miles north of Moscow as the probable deployment area of the weapon.

Employing satellite imagery from the recent past, an specialist told the agency he had detected multiple firing positions in development at the facility.

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