Ukrainian Drones Chased Down Russia's Hypersonic Missile Convoy
Scratch two Zircon missiles and their launcher
The hypersonic Zircon is one of Russia’s best long-range missiles
Fast and low-flying, the Zircon is hard to intercept
But its Bastion mobile launchers are vulnerable to drone attack
Striking harder across Crimea, Ukrainian drones recently pinpointed and blasted a Bastion—and blew up its two Zircons
Russia’s Zircon missile is very fast and very difficult to intercept. And that’s why it’s such a big deal that, on or just before Tuesday, Ukraine’s defense intelligence agency—the HUR—knocked out a Zircon launcher in Russian-occupied Crimea. (See video below.)
It’s the first hit on a Bastion launcher, which transports and fires two of the 10-m Zircon missiles. “Fewer launchers,” the Ukrainian defense ministry boasted. “Fewer missiles. Less capacity to strike Ukrainian cities.”
The HUR sortied long-range, first-person-view drones to strike the wheeled Bastion in a Russian convoy traveling near Simferopol, 160 km from the front line in southern Ukraine. That the Ukrainian drones could get anywhere near the Bastion convoy speaks to the ongoing collapse of Russian air defenses—not just in Crimea, but all along the 1,200-km front line of Russia’s 50-month wider war on Ukraine.
Increasingly incapable of protecting its most precious assets in a zone stretching hundreds of kilometers from the porous front line, the Russians are losing more hard-to-replace weapons. A single Zircon may cost $5 million. A Bastion launcher also costs millions of dollars. As recently as 2024, the HUR estimated Russia possessed just 40 Zircons. Now it has two fewer.
