What actually happened in Kremenchug

"Medusa" explains why the version of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation regarding the shelling of a shopping center looks false

As a result of the rocket strike of Russian troops at a shopping center in Kremenchug (Poltava region of Ukraine), at least 20 civilians were killed, dozens are listed as missing. Kyiv called the incident an act of terrorism and a "intentional attack on a civilian object." Russian officials first stated that this was a “new Ukrainian provocation in the style of buchi”, and then in a message the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation admitted that they fired at Kremenchug. However, according to the Russian military department, as a result of the impact “in the warehouse of foreign ammunition at the Kremenchug plant of road vehicles and their subsequent detonation, a non -functioning shopping center was damaged”. "Medusa" explains why the explanations of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation look false.

You Can Read this Explainer in English .

At about 16 hours on June 27, a powerful explosion occurred in the center of Kremenchug, and after almost ten seconds - the second. At the same time, a strong fire began in the local shopping center Amstor. In a few hours he burned to the ground.

According to the city authorities in the evening of the same day, 19 bodies were discovered at the fire site, one of the wounded died in the hospital. About 40 more people were probably in the shopping center - and since then they do not get in touch. More than 50 people with different injuries, mainly with burns, contacted doctors.

The Ukrainian Ministry of the Interior reported that the blow was inflicted on the K-22 missiles (that it was for missiles, read below) from the Tu-22 bombers who took off from the Shaikovka airfield in the Kaluga region.

Later, the Kremenchug authorities showed journalists a giant funnel and a destroyed workshop at the Amstor factory located near Amstor (known in the countries of the former USSR as a manufacturer of the Asphalt Predmash asphalt). The funnel is located about half a kilometer from the shopping center. Its location itself seems to confirm the version of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, which stated that it struck the factory where ammunition was stored: they allegedly detonated and set fire to the shopping center on the expanse. However, in fact, this is not so.

We will immediately explain why the version of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation does not withstand criticism

• Firstly, the “non-functioning shopping center”, contrary to the statement of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, actually worked: this is how he looked two days before the missile attack. Moreover, it turned out that a few days before the Kremenchug strike, the owners of the center ordered not to evacuate visitors and store workers during air alarm (which happen regularly there; the Ukrainian prosecutor's office has already promised to check the actions of the Amstora administration).
• Secondly, the shopping center was struck by another explosion-not the result of which a funnel on “Credmash” formed.
• Thirdly, the sequence of events in principle was the opposite: an explosion near the shopping center (which, apparently, led to a fire in Amstor) occurred ten seconds before the explosion in the factory workshop. Judging by the Google cards, there are no hangars directly at the scene near the shopping center where ammunition could theoretically be stored, about which the Russian Ministry of Defense tells.

Now we will tell in more detail what these statements are based on

On June 28, several videos from the surveillance cameras from the city park Kremenchug, which is located right behind the fence of the “Credmash” appeared: the plant is exactly in the middle between the park and Amstor. Judging by the rollers , people and birds on the pond in the park were alarmed-probably a distant explosion; And after 10 seconds, a new explosion occurred - and very close.

Having determined the location of objects shot in the video, it can be established that the epicenter of the second explosion was in the workshop of the Credmash plant. The epicenter of the first explosion on the shooting cannot be found-however, one of the videos shows how somewhere behind the plant (approximately where the shopping center is located) even before the second explosion thundered, a pillar of thick smoke rises.

In addition, at the disposal of Medusa there were photographs taken on the day of attack on Kremenchug from a hill of three kilometers from the plant and Amstor. He sent the pictures (as he claims) a resident of Kremenchug asked not to publish not only his name, but also the photo. On their basis, you can find out where he lives; The publication of such images can threaten the source of Medusa by criminal liability in Ukraine. It was not possible to confirm the version of the origin of Medusa; At the same time, we could not find signs of fake.

In the photo, two similar ones similar in power are visible; In one smoke, in the upper part of the “mushroom”, it has already begun to dissipate, from which it can be concluded that it occurred a little earlier. "Medusa" geolocked the place of shooting, as well as an approximate place of explosions. The first (where the smoke began to dissipate) happened in the area of ​​the Amstor shopping center; The second is on the territory of the Kredmash plant.

On a series of photos (which, judging by the change in mushroom clouds from explosions, they were made in a row in a row in tens of minutes), no traces of the secondary detonation of ammunition are visible (which, for example, were in Kiev in March 2022 after a missile strike at the Retroville shopping center, where the Ukrainian military hid artillery and shells). The smoke from the explosions simply continues to dissipate; In addition, it is clear that a fire begins in the area of ​​the shopping center.

It is possible to establish exactly where exactly next to Amstor exploded the rocket, comparing satellite pictures from April and on June 28, 2022. In the June, not only destruction in the shopping center is visible, but, presumably, a funnel from the explosion of the rocket - right next to a single -stone railway separating the territory of the shopping center and the plant. The probable place of the rocket hit is located several tens of meters from the wall of the shopping center, behind which the Comfy store was located. It was in this store, as follows from the stories of the employees of the shopping center, that the most dead and missing were most. There, immediately after the explosion, a fire raged. There was a video of the racket arrival from surveillance cameras, which confirms the location (the coordinates can be viewed here ).

Based on all these data, it is safe to say that the first rocket exploded in the immediate vicinity of Amstor, and the second - in the workshop of the Credmash plant. It is also likely that there was no “detonation of ammunition”, which, according to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, led to a fire in a shopping center, (at least, a day after the explosion, no evidence appeared that it was).

There is only one unexplored question: were ammunition or any military property at the Credmash plant? The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation announced this without providing any evidence. The authorities of Ukraine and the management of the plant deny any military activity at the enterprise. At the same time, no traces of ammunition at the factory in the reports of local journalists were noticed (the shooting was carried out almost a day after the blow).

Why the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation is unlikely to "deliberately" tried to get to the shopping center

Judging by what was discovered at the site of the explosions, it is difficult to draw a conclusion about a “deliberate attack” on a shopping center. The rocket did not fall directly into Amstor. The most crowded part of the shopping center - the Silpo supermarket, according to the employees of the center, almost did not suffer in the first minutes after the explosion (but then it was also destroyed by a fire). Formally, the explosions of both missiles occurred in the territory of the neighboring plant - but one of them fell in the immediate vicinity of Amstor. It is logical to assume that the plant was the goal of both blows.

The rest can be explained by the features of the missiles by which a blow is struck (if we accept the version of the Ukrainian authorities that these were K-22 missiles). The fact is that these missiles are not intended for accurate attacks of ground targets such as “building”. They were developed in the 1960s (and modernized in the 1970s) for a narrow niche of use-attacks by large groups of NATO ships and aircraft carriers.

The missiles have two complementary guidance methods:

• After modernization, the majority of the missile flight was blocked using the inertial system: at first the exact position of the carrier was determined at launch (the reference point in the coordinate system), and then the special system calculated all changes in the position of the rocket when it was removed from this reference point-height, course, as well as demolition angles due to wind. With these calculations, errors inevitably accumulate that do not allow the rocket to be removed to the target quite accurately to defeat even a large ship. The circular probable deviation from the target when using the X-22 only with the inertial system is, according to open data, about 500 meters.
• In order for the rocket to get into the aircraft carrier (already approaching it), the head of self -ownation was originally put in it with a radar indication: it itself was aimed at the ship with the greatest reflective ability. The goals of the type “Group of ships” (or a single ship in the conditions of radio-interference that interfere with radar guidance) due to the low accuracy of the inertial system during the late USSR, it was supposed to attack only nuclear ammunition with a capacity of one megaton.
• It is clear that the radar system is not suitable for an attack of the “plant of the factory” type, and therefore the rocket is used only in the attack mode of the “platform target”, but with the “ordinary” fragmentation-functioning warhead. At low accuracy, it allows her to hit the target very large mass of the combat part-about 900 kilograms, which is almost twice as much as the Iskander and Caliber operational-tactical and cruise missiles that Russia uses in this war. Almost twice the mass of the combat unit has a X-32 missile, which should be replaced by the X-22 troops (in addition, it should be much more accurate). The X-32 has a correction system using a heighter that allows you to find binding on the ground during the flight.
• The main advantage of the X-22 over other missiles-a lot of them were produced. So, only Ukraine, abandoning nuclear warheads and all missiles capable of carrying them, transferred almost 400 X-22 Russia. It is not known how many of them remained in the warehouses of the army of the Russian Federation (some were disposed of in recent decades), but it is clear that the Russian army can attack them for months - and more and more will be done as the arsenals of more modern missiles are exhausted.

Is it possible to beat such inaccurate, but with such powerful missiles on objects located in the city?

It is forbidden. In this case, there are signs of a war crime - one of the many committed by Russia during the invasion of Ukraine.

The shelling of the shopping center in Kremenchug shows that the Russian command, when choosing the means to defeat the goal, apparently focuses on their effectiveness and cost - and lastly thinks (if at all) about possible casualties among civilians.

Department "Parsing"