This remarkable footage appears to show a Russian plane spinning in circles as it descends from the sky after a Ukrainian STARStreak missile strikes it.
A MiG-31 Foxhound fighter jet being flown in Ukraine to launch a hypersonic missile shot down near the besieged city of Mariupol, but the pilots were safely ejected, and no injuries were reported.
The Russian Western Military District press service said the Cold War-era MiG-31 Foxhound fighter jet was shot down in the early morning of Tuesday during a bombing mission.
“April 26, in the Mariupol region, during a planned flight, a MiG-31 aircraft was shot down,” said the message.
Russia’s news agencies reported that the jet was intercepted by a Ukrainian missile without providing more detail.
MiG-31 Foxhound is a long-range, two-seat supersonic interceptor aircraft. It was derived from MiG-25 Foxbat interceptor and is equipped with a hypersonic missile. More than 500 MiG-31 aircraft have been produced, out of which 370 were delivered to the Russian Air Force and 30 are in service with Kazakhstan Air Force.
The MiG-31 was the first aircraft to use a phased array radar—the Zaslon passive electronically scanned array radar and weapons targeting system.
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