[quote=Allan from Fallbrook][quote=spdrun]Ucodgen- Reports and the Ukrainian government have at least one of the transports being shot down at 6,500 m or 21,000 ft. Too high for a manpad.[/quote]
Reuters is reporting that the system used was either an SA-11 Gadfly, or an SA-17 Grizzly, both successors to the Cold War SA-6 Gainful. These are tracked vehicles carrying a mounted rack of surface-to-air missiles capable of bringing down a commercial jetliner.
According to Jane’s, both Ukrainian and Russian forces have these.[/quote]Sounds like our respective news services can’t get their story straight, or are so much in a hurry to be first that they can’t take the time to double check their sources and the story.
Considering that no civilian AC have been shot down until this one, I have my doubts as to anything beyond a manpad being available to the separatists (till now). The ‘escalation’ in capability seems to match now getting such a system. I would suspect that Ukraine’s response to the shootdowns would be to fly higher and limit use of helicopters. The separatists would now need a device that could reach higher. Russia’s predictable behavior would be to see that extending the conflict in Ukraine by supporting the separatists would be in their own best interest.
