When Russia thinks it's better to admit gross incompetence than to be attacked by Ukraine.

"Move along nothing to see here this is simply a Special Fuel Explosion operation."

what ever the cause, it was good day for UKRAINE. SLAVA UKRAINE💙💛🇺🇦

Bravo Ukraine … all power to your stand

Foriegn aid or domestic, that was a wonderful shot. Slava Ukraine🇺🇦✌️

Here's my theory: ruzzian recon spotted an Ukrainian farmer with his tractor headed toward the airbase. They immediately radioed this intelligence back to the base, where an order was given to immediately destroy all aircraft, munitions, and fuel. The base commander will, undoubtedly, receive the award of Hero of the Ruzzian Federation, posthumously.

Nice bit of workmanship!

The problem is, there were huge explosions happening separate from each other, but at the exact same time. That means it wasn't a fuel truck exploding chain reaction kind of thing.

Statement from the Russian Ministry of Defence: "As a result of the explosion, no one was injured. Aviation equipment at the airfield was not damaged…” 🤔

Putin must ban smoking in all military facilities

Ukraine tenacity and fearlessness Brilliant

Democracies: Send Ukrainians everything they need pronto; let them put an end to Putin's folly. Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦🇨🇦!!

Victory to Ukraine. John Quinn, Glasgow, UK.

Awesome. Great work Ukraine. Keep it coming!

I notice that the damage is the area closest to the coast. I first suspected a small boat and Javelin or NLAW, or even timed charges. Very precise.

1:28 this guy has a logical, neutral explanation that actually covers all bases.

Just an old fashioned ground based sabotage operation with charges timed to detonate simultaneously. Not all of them went off as planned, but enough exploded successfully to represent a significant achievement for Ukrainian special forces. Good job lads and I hope you made it back home safely.

Lying in war can be a useful tactic, but lying to yourself can lead to defeat.

Large impact craters would clearly suggest a missile attack. Saboteurs could not cause such widespread damage and drones can't carry weapons with large enough warheads to cause such huge explosions.

Someday the Russians will understand that humans have more value in a demoractic nation. Ukrainians knows that death is better than life in Russia. Slava Ukraini with love from Sweden as proud new NATO members.

Russia also claimed the Moskva sinking was due to “a munitions fire on board”, the excuse is getting lame now

And this is why not to blow the bridge. As Sun Tzu advised: "Always leave your enemies a way to retreat".

Looks like Putan's gonna have to move air assets further back out of HARMS way

Russia has been having a lot of 'accidents' recently... Always reminds me of 'The Hunt for Red October' by Tom Clancy where in the movie the U.S. guy says to the Russia 'You haven't lost another submarine have you?'. Or something to that effect.

I also saw one possibility : a commando strike that landed nearby (it's close to the sea), infiltrated the airbase, placed explosives on anything that goes boom, then detonated it all. Ukraine already did that months ago to an helicopter base on the other side of the Dniepr, but doing that in Crimea would be even more daring, while showing dreadful gaps in russian defensive systems.

line of sight operation neatly done. T.E. Lawrence would be proud of the guys that did this.

Amazing news. Bravo, great achievement for Ukraine.

Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦, cheers from Spain 🇪🇸

You can see the helicopter blade through a cars window. So yes there is evidence of at least some helicopter damage. But at least 9 planes destroyed including weapons storages

A lil $200 drone with AT grenade would be small, fast, cheap and hard to detect. Fly one into a tanker truck next to a full plane. then boom! Now use 10 of them at once....

Russia does have the boomerang missiles that are capable of serious damage !

Anyone else see the flash in the mushroom cloud at 1:39 ? Small bolt of lighting from the dust?

Good work

There were some 3 big craters at the airfield. Not sabotage. The craters were missile strikes.

I love that the RuSSians have no idea what hit them.

Amazing !!! well done to the brave Ukrainian army

i never see so great view in my live!!!!

Simplest explanation is a saboteur grabbed a gas can and light a match in just the right spots while no one was looking. Perhaps even a good Russian wanting to protest the war.

Imagine your military being so incompetent that they leave aircraft full of fuel and loaded with munitions parked next to each other not far from the front lines of a war. Ever think of storing the munitions and leaving the Jets with minimal fuel when they're not needed? Russia's military is a total joke, not even third rate.

Latest theory: A seagull holding a lit cigarette was identified as an immediate aerial threat, and a dozen of the now-famous Russian 'Boomerang' AA missiles were launched from the airbase to "intercept"...

It may have been drones, but my guess is that they are now firing HIMARS from aircraft. Carrying HIMARS to high altitude and speed would significantly increase their range. It sure looks like HIMARS hits from the images. The reason people are fleeing Crimea is not the fear of being hit, but the fear of being trapped. They are afraid the Kerch bridge is in range and will be the next target.

I think you missed the biggest contender, Neptune ASM. Although it is a heavily modified Soviet anti-ship missile, many of those had ground attack mode. As an airfield is a big and stationary target, it could’ve been easily used.

Cracking job Ukraine 🇺🇦 forces!!!!...💥💥👍

"For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind."

SCARY...

Classic long range reconnaissance sabotage operation! Executed successfully, well done to anyone involved!

yes

Probably Atacams cluster considering the craters everywhere

It's about time Russians had even a small taste of what Ukrainians have been experiencing for months now. Slava Ukraine.

May even have been the Switchblade 600

Very pretty scene !

When my grandfather was there the circumstances were similar hot. Earnd the Krim Schild for that time. But thereafter his whole live he want's to visit crimea again.

Dah bridge outstanding

Neptune anti ship cruise missile has 170 mile range . They could have modified a few to some kind of GPS guidance .

I spent the summers of 2000 and 2001 in Sevastopol. There are many budget options in the Crimea for non-elite vacationers. Many camp out in tents, and there are camps for children.

You guys are so wrong on range of GMLRS. It has a MINIMUM range of about 110 miles and a maximum well over 450 miles ATACMS is 600 mile range.

Losing hundreds of millions in aircraft is a bad day. If it's 9 destroyed and perhaps more damaged, if we're being conservative and saying the planes go for $50 million, the cost had to be near half a billion when damage to others is included. That's a great day for Ukraine, not so great for Russia.

Impressive craters

HIMARS(at least the newest version) targeting computer is able to compensate for firing during transport on a [slow?] moving ship or barge. But I don't know how they could get a boat, big enough to carry a 20ton truck, into those waters undetected.

Nice

Force News, your AFU scenarios for the Novofedorivka Air Base attack are too nebulous. Let's apply occurs razor to the discussion. The Novofederivka Air Base event has the earmarks of a Spetsnaz attack and the AFU has an estimated 4000 Spetsnaz troops. However, timing is a critical flaw in any Spetsnaz attack plan requiring penetration of a secure air base. Murphy's law is likely to be a show stopper for obvious reasons. Namely, access difficulties, fake IDs, discovery, complex explosive transport issues, and escape exigencies. There is a simpler solution to that dilemma. Thirteen miles NW of the center of the base's runway is an infantry training facility at Lymanne. It is somewhat remote and appears active, but little used. The camp has trench work and firing ranges, and is served by the small Lymanne airstrip adjacent to it. The base would provide a relatively safe location to assemble the attack components. Interdicting fire from the Lymanne base, or from any road-served location closer to the Novofedorivka would be feasible options. Fire from an array of relatively short range weapons, corrected by a couple of observers located in buildings overlooking the Novofederivka airfield, or a variety of remote reconnaissance means would vastly simplify the operation. The ensuing conflagration at Novofedoriveka would obscure the attack in progress and facilitate escape options.

THE BRONK! Nice to see he's now got a bit of decoration on his walls. Last interview he did they were bare as he'd only just moved in.

Wondering what mlrs missiles the UK might have supplied?

It was the Grandson of Major Stirling and LRDG.

Could it have been Russian "friendly fire"?

Yo....expert! Did you see the three impact craters in the satellite images......Fuel trucks? Really? You really need to find "experts" that can interpret satellite imagery.

The Kremlin denies that any plane was damaged during the accident, and we all know how credible the claims of the Kremlin tends to be

Theory #1: Done by armed suicide drones, maybe a 600 Switchblade which carries same warhead as the Javelin, but modified to fit the drone's profile. The drones hit the exposed above ground storage of ammo clusters, resulting the large craters, at least three, that are seen in the sat photos of before and after....in the before image note the location of the three ammo sites and corresponding craters perfectly overlayed in the after image. How the drones got there, I suspect brought in and used by special op of small team or two, and launched somewhere within 25-50 radius of airfield. Theory #2: The small stealth drone boats that everyone has forgotten about. These drone boats supplied early in war by U.S. carry Hellfire missiles. The Hellfire has a short range, but highly accurate, so given the proximity of airfield to sea, maybe so.

Drones possibly carrying Explosive devices but for the Damage done look at the craters left ..Could very well be a Missile Strike

with the resorts so close if it were a missile it would have been heard / seen. UAV strike seems more likely or saboteurs on the ground

Get some, orcs, get some! I think Ukraine may have quietly been supplied with, and used, the 300 km range version of HIMARS, the M270. If so, this is great news. Ukraine can stand back and blast the orcs from a great distance.

I'd really like to know if the five IL-76 craft survived. There were four parked close together further to the west. Those are crucial for high-value munitions logistics, equally as important to neutralise if possible.

Don't ask what can your country do for you, instead ask: WHAT AIRDEFENSE DOING?

A chain of explosion that happen at the same instant? Two strikes at the same instant.

The aircraft remains looked as though the planes had been picked of individually.

Or could it be a rerun of Operation Squatter 1941? Look at how close the airfield is to the sea.

If it was SF, it makes pebble Island look like a range day

A Russian goodwill demolition

I think these were planted explosives, the timing was the same between the two biggest explosions

Dimitry accidentally throws a cigarette but into the Ammo rack.

Idea. Switchblade munitions from several miles away. Target the ammo and fuel. When tons of explosives and fuel detonate the over pressure will rupture and crush everything. Look at the related photos of cars parked next to the air base. Using switchblades no commando has to actually risk getting near the wire, no noise, no radar signature.

Do Russian boats, planes, helicopters, and buildings typically spontaneously combust at this rate, or is this at all increased since they started attacking Ukraine? I'm starting to think I never want to own anything Russian-made, for fear it might just blow up in my hands.

Great news, this strike will save lots of lives in cities across Ukraine. SLAVA UKRAINE 🌻!

Unlikely it was a HARM missile, because a Ukraine pilot would have to fly 30-40 kilometers behind enemy lines to get in the missiles range. It's possible, but it would be near suicidal for the pilot.

The huge metal beam that went through a car was probably from the building at 45.092202, 33.585088. I make the distance from that building to the car at about 360m -- too far for the kind of improvised explosive they might have deployed using a drone, in fact, that distance might be more than you might expect from the 150kg warhead of the Neptune.. More likely the building was used to arm the AC with weapons and some of those weapons cooked off resulting in a substantial explosion. Also, many of the AC were in revetments that should have protected them from being destroyed by nearby explosions or fire and that suggests to me that multiple smaller weapons were used to target them individually. Other than the building and one AC at the right of the sat image I don't see any obvious cratering so it appears that directed weapons were used. My guess is that a Ukrainian Spec Ops team set charges on the AC and then beat feet before the SHTF. Whatever it was it was HUGELY effective.

Guess we'll never know.

Time to get them longer range capability weapons🇺🇸

There are clearly 4-5 giant impact craters on the Satilite photos. Ukraine has a weapon that can reach several hundred miles.

Explain the Mach 2.5 Missiles launched and tracked from Odessa Oblast minutes before the impacts.....someones not telling the whole truth.

Is it possible that a Specops type crew went in and installed high powered explosives around the base and set them off remotely and simultaneously, using the Black Sea as a way to infiltrate and exfiltrate? I'm just guessing here.

Would be surprised if the SAS are involved.

I hear the music to A Summer Place

They have a awful lot of these malfunctions.. one could almost argue they were not exactly truthful.

These drones don't have the range either. I don't think it was a drone. Then the HARM don't have the range to reach the base and it's very unlikely a Mig 29 was able to get close enough to take out the SAMs there...

According to Hollywood, it was a frag grenade

Russia blaming their own soldiers incompetence rather than Ukranian competence is laughable. But it's even better if Ukraine and the allies support that idea. Russia's self confidence would hit rock bottom when they realize they can't trust their soldiers not to kill each other. It would be a moral suicide for the Russian army. Slava Ukraini with love from Sweden as proud pending members of NATO.

That attack was spectacular and awesome. Congrats to Ukraine, and I look forward to seeing more Russian hardware and personnel getting blown to pieces.

whatever or whoever' well done.. give that man a cigar

Very good news, hoping for more of the same.

I'm sure someone has give them long range missiles for himars..don't mean we will ever know about it