How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[AlsatianFelix]

Don't care how. Eyes forward watching Tokmak.

[Billy Ringo]

Definition of inflection point

1 : a moment when significant change occurs or may occur.

 

From an historical perspective, the exact timing of civilian/military uprisings can be hard if not impossible to predict.  As has been discussed previously it can be something as small as a Tunisian burning himself in protest, or something more catastrophic.

 

The recent significant Ukrainian advances/Russian losses, uptick in internal Russian political and military maneuvering, mobilization,  hundreds of thousands of Russian men leaving the country, increase in depth and breadth of warnings to Putin about using nukes coming from multiple countries.

 

And now this.  We may have just reached that inflection point.   

 

Did the Ukrainians intentionally wait until a moment such as this to blow the bridge?  (Assuming they did it.)

[acrashb]

One can analyze and laugh at the same time:

 

 

 

[LongLeftFlank]

'Tis but a scratch....

 

 

Edited October 8, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[LongLeftFlank]

30 minutes ago, acrashb said:

One can analyze and laugh at the same time:

 

 

 

The Ukes are inside Vova's head, which is probably why they executed the operation they knew they could pull off, on this particular day.

Illia P's Twitter comments have jumped the s̶h̶a̶r̶k̶ dolphin at this point....

 

 

Edited October 8, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[Aragorn2002]

23 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

'Tis but a scratch....

 

 

[Probus]

Photo from a new angle may shed some light on how the AFU took down the bridge:

Sorry, sorry. Couldn't help myself...

[Probus]

35 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

'Tis but a scratch....

 

 

HA!  That is hilarious!  Ran out of likes...

[LongLeftFlank]

5 minutes ago, Probus said:

Photo from a new angle may shed some light on how the AFU took down the bridge:

Sorry, sorry. Couldn't help myself...

Götsill mit uns!

[poesel]

14 hours ago, Bennie said:

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/natural-gas/use-of-natural-gas.php

38% electric power

33% industrial

15% residential

11% commercial

3% transportation

Thank you and everyone else who answered. I seem to have hit perfectly the lull before the bridge blew up!

In comparison, the numbers from Germany (from: https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/37985/umfrage/verbrauch-von-erdgas-in-deutschland-nach-abnehmergruppen-2009/)

37% industrial

38% residential
(from this: 31% local & 7% district heating)

13% commercial

12% electric power

0.2% transportation

 

[Pete Wenman]

Loads of speculation here and elsewhere (no surprise)

But lets try a different angle - what can we gleen from this image - not the CCTV footage but the wider image

 

We appear to be in a CCTV monitoring room. It's being filmed by a phone or equivalent and has been released into the public domain. Who is this content meant for.

The camera (looks to be fixed)and  is showing pretty much the exact spot the explosion occurred.

It seems an odd location for a typical CCTV, and so you assume this is part of the bridge defence network, with the camera not monitoring traffic flow, but the actual bridge structure.

Above the main screen appears to composite views showing 18 other camera views

It seems the footage is being watched after the event as there is little emotion in the voices that can be heard

@Grigb - Can you translate 

On the video itself 

The wave seen in the video under the span closest to right screen edge is being suggested as a boat by some, but the explosion and span that collapses is the other side of the nearest bridge support. 

It could be the wake from a fast moving boat that goes under the next span/rams the next bridge support, or it could just be a wave.

The explosion itself seems not so much a flash and bang, but rather to be a flash and burn with something on the right being a smoke source for some several seconds - can be seen in the video around the 45 second mark.

Disclaimer - I have no real idea what I'm talking about, but there are some interesting aspects to this video.

 

P

[RockinHarry]

1 hour ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Yeah, at this point I feel like the burden is on the 'boat' or 'missile' advocates to show evidence for their implements of destruction, not just point out holes in the truck bomb theory.

Look, other than being a WW2/milhist geek since age 7, I know even less than you do about demolitions, but it seems like if you can SOMEHOW bring charges on a boat, your target is the bridge pier, not the bridge section (gravity takes care of that bit). 

And you don't want a thermite 'blowtorch', you want something with maximum, preferably confined, blast that shatters the reinforced cement into a gazillion fragments.  HE grogs, please chime in.

....And no matter what kind of charge you use, you get a giant fountain of water in addition to the cloud of debris, cuz, well,  half your blast goes DOWN, barring a shaped charge. And I never heard of those used in structural demolition work, but then I've led a sheltered life.  And then you kind of well, expect to see half of a jagged and shattered piling standing there, with skeletal rebar sticking out the top.  Anyone got photos of that?

...At dawn, you also expect to see a bunch of soaking wet rail cars and adjacent bridge sections, covered with rubble or dust, not twisted and charred black or burning merrily like Guy Fawkes night.

as said just a noob bits of fantasizing. Let them try repairing since we know how good they are at repairing and maintaining stuff. Best case let them do and next train attempts crossing it goes down with the whole section. Why wasting another accidentally burning truck (or whatever´s the cause) when russians can do so much better themselves. But the whole thing is ~18km long and I´d prefer getting it "shortened" bits more.

[keas66]

Curious if the the timing of this was more than just a Birthday Gift . Maybe the start of a 3rd Offensive starting soon  as mentioned towards/around  Tokmak - to really put the pressure on the Russian Logistics  . Imagine trying to combat a Third front , a Broken Kerch Bridge and  still having to supply your Guys in Kherson ...all at the same time .

[Battlefront.com]

I'm still as baffled by this as everybody else, so the best I can do is summarize what has been revealed and speculated upon since I took my nap

First thing we have to admit to ourselves is that this is no Saki puzzle to piece together.  With Saki there were a couple of theories floated very quickly and one of them quickly showed itself to fit ALL of the evidence.  Namely, four Hrim-2 missiles.  The theory was fairly easily refined over a couple of days because the information we had access to all conformed to the Hrim-2 theory.  All other theories, by contrast, struggled to survive contact with the evidence.

I know it's still young days yet, but I'm not seeing an obvious contender that fits all the evidence easily and neatly.  One reason for this is, I suspect, that the nature of this incident is heavily influenced by structural conditions that existed prior to the explosion.  Meaning, there's a lot of geeky physics stuff that is at play here that wasn't in the mix for Saki, thus making it harder for us to piece together the details.  There was a famous condo collapse in Florida a couple of years ago that illustrates how critical details are to figuring out the cause of catastrophic failures.

So, I think the only think we can conclude right now is that this one is not going to be wrapped up neatly and tied with a pretty bow.  I think some questions might hang out there unanswered for quite some time.  That means we have to make allowances for pure speculation and/or inconsistencies with whatever theories we're discussing.

Steve

[LongLeftFlank]

22 minutes ago, keas66 said:

Curious if the the timing of this was more than just a Birthday Gift . Maybe the start of a 3rd Offensive starting soon  as mentioned towards/around  Tokmak - to really put the pressure on the Russian Logistics  . Imagine trying to combat a Third front , a Broken Kerch Bridge and  still having to supply your Guys in Kherson ...all at the same time .

Barring further forensic evidence, it seems like this blast was intended to take out the northbound lane of the road bridge on this particular day, which it did, spectacularly.  The spectactular train fire seems like to have been hoped for, but not relied upon.

So it seems the Kerch rail link is not out permanently.... yet.  And it will be more heavily guarded than ever. But the UA GenStaff is inside Stavka's head now.

... Should they shove as much kit and supplies across today as they have on hand, depriving other hard pressed fronts?  Materiel, especially artillery ammo and  rockets, can't be everywhere at once.

This is another massive stressor for the Russians, and another genius strategic move for the UA, levering their much shorter interior lines.

Edited October 8, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[Battlefront.com]

Here's my take on analyzing the possibilities:

1. SOF placed charges
2. water borne attack
3. missile strike
4. truck bomb
5. some coordinated combination of the above

#1 is just silly due to how much explosives and how long it would have taken to pull off.  I think we can easily rule that one out.

#2 seems unlikely simple because the one thing I have some confidence on Russia defending against is a waterborne attack.  Even a submarine would have difficulty getting through.  Even if we assume something got through, it would have been highly prone to failure for a number of reasons.  Ukraine has no history of wild gambles on targets like this.  Instead, they wait until they have a near sure thing and this certainly wouldn't be that.  Plus, I don't think the explosion is consistent with something coming from under the bridge and it would almost certainly not have damaged the train because the bridge would have blocked the after effects.  I think we should rule this one out too.

#3 a missile strike would only be possible by either Hrim-2 or ATACMS.  I think we should rule out ATACMS for now simply because there's no evidence that the US made some sort of exception to its reluctance to let Ukraine have any.  Though it is probable this is how we'd find out.  Still, I think Ukraine would have used more than one as they aren't all that powerful per missile.  Hrim-2, on the other hand, is massively powerful.  I am going to deal with this one after the end.

#4 truck bomb seems more likely, but... I don't know.  The details seem to be pretty difficult.  First, there is the problem of getting that much explosives into a truck in the first place.  How would Ukraine source all of those explosives without serious risk of being caught?  What degree of confidence would they have that they'd get it through the detection infrastructure?  Throw all the explanations you want at it and it still comes out being extremely risky and extremely unlikely to have worked.  Again, Ukraine doesn't have a history of wild-arsed-attempts that are highly prone to failure.  I'd rule out the truck bomb possibility almost because of that alone.

The next reason to doubt the truck bomb theory is there would have to be some sort of significant fragmentation element to have set off even one railcar, not to mention multiple ones.  I do not think this is plausible, therefore the train would have to have come from a SECOND source (see #5).  Further, if Ukraine wanted to blow up the bridge in this manner it would have been vastly easier to sabotage a railcar in all ways.  It also would have been more desirable to damage the railbridge, therefore focusing on it instead of the far less certain road bridge effect.

Lastly, the Russians were quick to point their finger at a truck bomb.  Russians tend to point their finger at something convenient instead of the real cause.  An official Russian explanation is more often than not wrong.  So if Russia is saying it's a truck bomb, it's almost akin to saying it wasn't a truck bomb.
 

#5 should be ruled out.  Too many points of failure with any one thing, so combining two or more together is almost certainly not going to work.  Again, high risk of failure is not Ukraine's style.

Sooo.....

I'm leaning towards my old favorite... Hrim-2.  Now I've got to type up why!  New post coming.

Steve

[LongLeftFlank]

2 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Here's my take on analyzing the possibilities:

1. SOF placed charges
2. water borne attack
3. missile strike
4. truck bomb
5. some coordinated combination of the above

#1 is just silly due to how much explosives and how long it would have taken to pull off.  I think we can easily rule that one out.

#2 seems unlikely simple because the one thing I have some confidence on Russia defending against is a waterborne attack.  Even a submarine would have difficulty getting through.  Even if we assume something got through, it would have been highly prone to failure for a number of reasons.  Ukraine has no history of wild gambles on targets like this.  Instead, they wait until they have a near sure thing and this certainly wouldn't be that.  Plus, I don't think the explosion is consistent with something coming from under the bridge and it would almost certainly not have damaged the train because the bridge would have blocked the after effects.  I think we should rule this one out too.

#3 a missile strike would only be possible by either Hrim-2 or ATACMS.  I think we should rule out ATACMS for now simply because there's no evidence that the US made some sort of exception to its reluctance to let Ukraine have any.  Though it is probable this is how we'd find out.  Still, I think Ukraine would have used more than one as they aren't all that powerful per missile.  Hrim-2, on the other hand, is massively powerful.  I am going to deal with this one after the end.

#4 truck bomb seems more likely, but... I don't know.  The details seem to be pretty difficult.  First, there is the problem of getting that much explosives into a truck in the first place.  How would Ukraine source all of those explosives without serious risk of being caught?  What degree of confidence would they have that they'd get it through the detection infrastructure?  Throw all the explanations you want at it and it still comes out being extremely risky and extremely unlikely to have worked.  Again, Ukraine doesn't have a history of wild-arsed-attempts that are highly prone to failure.  I'd rule out the truck bomb possibility almost because of that alone.

The next reason to doubt the truck bomb theory is there would have to be some sort of significant fragmentation element to have set off even one railcar, not to mention multiple ones.  I do not think this is plausible, therefore the train would have to have come from a SECOND source (see #5).  Further, if Ukraine wanted to blow up the bridge in this manner it would have been vastly easier to sabotage a railcar in all ways.  It also would have been more desirable to damage the railbridge, therefore focusing on it instead of the far less certain road bridge effect.

Lastly, the Russians were quick to point their finger at a truck bomb.  Russians tend to point their finger at something convenient instead of the real cause.  An official Russian explanation is more often than not wrong.  So if Russia is saying it's a truck bomb, it's almost akin to saying it wasn't a truck bomb.
 

#5 should be ruled out.  Too many points of failure with any one thing, so combining two or more together is almost certainly not going to work.  Again, high risk of failure is not Ukraine's style.

Sooo.....

I'm leaning towards my old favorite... Hrim-2.  Now I've got to type up why!  New post coming.

Steve

....But why missile the (duplicate) roadway instead of the (irreplaceable) railway?

[Battlefront.com]

My leading theory... a single Hrim-2 strike.  Here are my reasons:

1. Of all the possibilities a missile strike is the one that best fits Occam's Razor test.  A single missile strike is the simplest explanation, therefore the most likely.
2. It is the most assured of success, least likely to have failed.  Not just in having a good effect but having ANY effect at all. 
3. Russia wasn't able to do anything against the 4 missiles that struck Saki, including attempted interception.  Therefore, the lack of response ahead of the strike is consistent with the previous known strikes.  None of Russia's other precautions, such as bomb detection and water patrols, are relevant.
4. The amount of explosive power of a Hrim-2 is sufficient to explain all damage.  Not only does it have enough force to cause a catastrophic effect on the bridge itself, it has fragmentation effects built into it.  This is the easiest way to explain the fact that the explosion is below the train by quite a bit and yet it hit the train in several places.  We've seen collateral damage like that in Saki.
5. The CEP of the Hrim-2 is not sufficient to be assured of hitting a specific span of bridge, either rail or road.  However, if aimed at the center point of the bridge width, they would be nearly assured of hitting something.  Any significant damage to any part of the bridge would be a success, so this is consistent with Ukraine wanting a sure bet.  It also explains why the road bridge was hit instead of the rail portion, which is what one would think they'd prefer to destroy.
6. Coordinating the strike with the fuel train would be fairly straight forward and well within Ukraine's known ISR capabilities.
7. There are plenty of trucks going across the bridge and so the chances of one kinda being close enough to the impact is fairly high.  Ukraine, of course, wouldn't have cared about there being some apparent cause and effect with a truck.
8. It is probable that Ukraine could have built a single Hrim-2, but maybe not more.  Using one would likely be enough to cause damage, so timing it with Putin's birthday and what's going on at the front is pretty straight forward.
9. This is the sort of target that Ukraine would expend a Hrim-2 on.  In fact, Ukraine hinted at this exact thing after they struck Saki with Hrim-2.
10. Ukraine is taking responsibility for it but, like Saki, is hinting that it was something other than a Hrim-2 attack.  In this case SBU operation.

There you go.  My case for this being a Hrim-2 attack.

As far as I can see my theory fits all known information.  So far I don't see anything that contradicts it.  Occam's Razor is favoring my theory far more than any of the others.

Steve

[Bulletpoint]

Hrim-2 has a 500 kilo warhead. Is that really enough to produce a blast that size?

[Battlefront.com]

13 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

....But why missile the (duplicate) roadway instead of the (irreplaceable) railway?

See #5 above.  It has to do with limitations with the accuracy of the missile.  10m CEP is sufficient to assure a hit on the bridge generally, but not sufficient to guarantee a hit on the rail bridge.  If Ukraine aimed for the rail portion they would risk it missing the bridge entirely on one side or hitting the road bridge on the other side.  Far better to aim at the center mass of the entire bridge and be happy with a hit, whatever it impacted.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Just now, Bulletpoint said:

Hrim-2 has a 500 kilo warhead. Is that really enough to produce a blast that size?

I think so.  Especially when you consider the impact also has supersonic mass effect.

Remember, the video we're seeing of the explosion is a night camera.  It is going to make the explosion look bigger and more intense than it was.  Not that a 500kg warhead is going to have difficulty being impressive!

Steve

[LongLeftFlank]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

See #5 above.  It has to do with limitations with the accuracy of the missile.  10m CEP is sufficient to assure a hit on the bridge generally, but not sufficient to guarantee a hit on the rail bridge.  If Ukraine aimed for the rail portion they would risk it missing the bridge entirely on one side or hitting the road bridge on the other side.  Far better to aim at the center mass of the entire bridge and be happy with a hit, whatever it impacted.

Steve

 

Edited October 8, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[Tenses]

2 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

Hrim-2 has a 500 kilo warhead. Is that really enough to produce a blast that size?

This. I am no expert but just look at the size of the blast compared to the truck, which was engulfed. It is monstrous. I am for a truck bomb but if Steve says this is 500kg then I don't want to see how bigger warheads work...

[poesel]

If I had one (1) missile to spend on the Kerch bridge, I would have aimed at the part with the longest bridge span (the 'bridgy' part of the bridge) not at an ordinary part.
The longest span is more susceptible to damage and more difficult to repair.

That would be my one argument against the missile theory - it would have landed somewhere else.

[TheVulture]

2 minutes ago, Tenses said:

This. I am no expert but just look at the size of the blast compared to the truck, which was engulfed. It is monstrous. I am for a truck bomb but if Steve says this is 500kg then I don't want to see how bigger warheads work...

But look at how bright the headlights and tail lights are in the footage due to the exposure levels the to the twilight conditions. It's hard to gauge taking that in to account.