Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has dumped 24 tonnes of water on forests being ravaged by wildfires.
Yesterday, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin assisted with fire-fighting efforts. As co-pilot of a Beriyev Be-200 amphibious aircraft, he dumped water on two fire sources in the Ryazan Region.
Putin's plane landed at Dyagilevo military airbase near Ryazan. Putin subsequently boarded a Be-200 amphibious aircraft serving with the air fleet of the Ministry of Civil Defence, Emergencies and Disaster Relief. Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu and Ryazan Region Governor Oleg Kovalyov also climbed aboard.
Shoigu first showed Putin an operational thermal imaging system which helps locate forest fires and track how they spread. The screen showed fires obscured by clouds of smoke. The plane flew over them and dumped 12 tonnes of water at a time. The Be-200's targetting system is similar to that of Tupolev Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers (See reference note).
Soon after take-off, the prime minister entered the cockpit and sat in the co-pilot's seat. Merited Pilot of Russia Rafail Zakirov briefed him on controlling plane. After that, Putin controlled the water-intake system, as the plane skimmed the Oka River, then dropping the water on fires near Ryazan. It took the plane only 11 seconds to collect 12 tonnes of water from the river and to rise back into the sky. Several minutes later, the Be-200 descended to a level just above the tree tops and making a sharp curve dropped the water onto the fires.
After the flight, the prime minister thanked the pilots and left the airbase for the town of Kriusha, which was seriously affected by a forest fire in late July.
Putin has piloted a plane several times before. In October 1999, he performed a 10-minute flight aboard a Sukhoi Su-25-UB Frogfoot ground-attack jet, while visiting a training centre at the Krasnodar Higher Military Aviation School. In March 2000, then President Vladimir Putin flew the same warplane from Krasnodar to Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, controlling it for eight minutes in mid-air. In 2005, President Putin flew the Pavel Taran Tu-160 strategic bomber into an area where strategic long-range aviation and the Northern Fleet were exercising and launching cruise missiles. The flight lasted five hours, with Putin sitting in the command chair. The Tu-160 refueled from an Ilyushin Il-78 Midas aerial refueling tanker enroute.
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The Blackjack can see any target
The Tupolev Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bomber is currently the largest and most powerful warplane in the world. The bomber is equipped with the Obzor-K (Survey-K) multi-mode radar for navigation and attack, facilitating the plane's automatic flight and combat use round the clock in any region and regardless of local weather conditions. The PNA-D attack radar can lock onto any target and ensures high accuracy for bombing. Moreover, the Tu-160 features the OPB-15-T Groza remote optical bombsight which facilitates high bombing accuracy of up to one metre any time of the day and in any weather conditions.
Pavel Arabov