Russia's 9M370 Burevestnik: 5 Facts On 'Flying Chernobyl'

Russia’s 9M370 Burevestnik is a nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed cruise missile.

US researchers recently located the deployment site of Russia’s new nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed cruise missile, the 9M370 Burevestnik. Nicknamed “flying Chernobyl,” the missile has been touted by President Putin as “invincible.”

Here’s your 5-point cheatsheet to this deadly weapon:

  1. According to Sputnik News, Development work on the Burevestnik began in December 2001, shortly after the US announced its intention to withdraw from the ABM Treaty. 

  2. “Burevestnik,” which means “stormbringer,” “prophet of a storm,” or “petrel” in Russian, was the name given to the prospective cruise missile in 2018, several weeks after its existence was revealed, in an online vote open to the public by the Russian Defense Ministry.

  3. Putin has said the weapon – dubbed the SSC-X-9 Skyfall by NATO – has an almost unlimited range and can evade US missile defences. But some Western experts dispute his claims and the Burevestnik’s strategic value, saying it will not add capabilities that Moscow does not already have and risks a radiation-spewing mishap.

  4. The two researchers identified a construction project abutting a nuclear warhead storage facility known by two names – Vologda-20 and Chebsara – as the new missile’s potential deployment site. The facility is 295 miles (475 km) north of Moscow.

  5. In 2020, then-UK Chief of Defense Intelligence Lt Gen Jim Hockenhull warned that the Burevestnik has what is effectively a “global reach and would allow attack from unexpected directions,” giving Moscow a weapon with a “near infinite loiter time.”