Russian frigate equipped with hypersonic Zircon rockets will take part in joint drills in South Africa in February, TASS states.
A Russian warship equipped with hypersonic cruise weapons will participate in workouts with the Chinese and South African navies in February, according to Russia’s state-owned TASS news company.
The report on Monday was the very first authorities reference of the involvement by the Russian frigate Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union Gorshkov.
The frigate is equipped with Zircon rockets, which fly at 9 times the speed of noise and have a series of more than 1,000 km (620 miles).
The rockets form the centrepiece of Russia’s hypersonic toolbox, together with the Avangard slide lorry that went into fight task in 2019.
‘Admiral Gorshkov’ … will go to the logistic assistance point in Syria’s Tartus, and after that participate in joint marine workouts with the Chinese and South African navies,” TASS stated in its report, pointing out an unknown defence source.
The South African National Defence Force has stated the drills will range from February 17-26 near the port cities of Durban and Richards Bay on South Africa’s east coast.
It stated on Thursday that the joint workout intends “to reinforce the currently growing relations in between South Africa, Russia and China”.
The workout will be the 2nd including the 3 nations in South Africa, after a drill in 2019, the defence force included.
The Gorshkov held workouts in the Norwegian Sea previously this month after President Vladimir Putin sent it to the Atlantic Ocean in a signal to the West that Russia would not pull back over the war in Ukraine.
Putin has formerly stated the frigate and its Zircon rockets have “no analogues worldwide”.
The Russian president sees the weapons as a method to pierce the United States’s significantly advanced rocket defences.
Russia, the United States and China remain in a race to establish hypersonic weapons, viewed as a method to acquire an edge over any enemy due to the fact that of their speed and their manoeuvrability, functions that make them more difficult to discover.