The houses around it are completely destroyed, razed to the ground by relentless Russian shelling, and the dirt road is scarred by shrapnel. All that can be heard is the sound of a bomb being dropped, followed seconds later by a mighty explosion.
The bomb smashes into the ground 10m from the building, opening up a huge crater before a swelling fireball engulfs the entire three floors. When the smoke eventually dissipates, the footage shows the building’s whole roof has been ripped off.
This, Russian military bloggers are claiming, is the first test of a 3000kg glide bomb, otherwise known as the Fab-3000, a modified munition that is packed with nearly a tonne and a half of explosives. Earlier versions of these explosives, which are Soviet-era munitions retrofitted with fixed wings and GPS navigation systems that extend their range beyond the reach of Ukrainian anti-air defences, appeared earlier this year. These were the Fab-500s and the Fab-1500s.
This building is located on the eastern side of Lyptsi, a small village just behind the front line in the northeast Ukrainian region of Kharkiv. The area has been under relentless ground and aerial assault since thousands of Vladimir Putin’s forces pushed over the border from Russia in mid-May. Having moved several miles towards the region’s namesake capital, home to around 1.3 million civilians, Ukraine’s forces have managed to halt the attack about two miles north of Lyptsi. It is about 20 miles from Kharkiv.
This alleged new model threatens to worsen an already dire situation facing not only Ukraine’s soldiers but the millions of civilians living within range of these glide bombs.
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