PF Warships Held Firing Drills

16.09.2011 Pacific Fleet (PF) warships conducted firing drills on Sept 15 under large-scale maneuvers of Eastern Military District, told temporal press-center of Eastern Military District at Kamchatka to Central Navy Portal.

After PF marines completed landing assault operation on unprepared coast in Avachinskaya Bay, the large scale exercise continues at Kamchatka; over 50 ships, tens of airplanes and helicopters, and up to 10,000 servicemen and civilians are involved.

Having left Avachinskaya Bay, the fleet’s attack group led by Guard missile cruiser Varyag reached blue water and received training task to repel an air strike. Changing the cruise formation into a combat one, ships detected dummy targets by onboard radars. Varyag fired at air targets first. According to the exercise scenario, missilemen and gunmen of destroyer Bystry and large ASW ships Admiral Tributs and Admiral Vinogradov were supposed to finish the firing drill.

Exercise directors assessed rapidity and accuracy of target kills. Firing was performed by SAM systems Fort and Kinzhal, as well as gun mounts. Various electronic warfare means were also applied apart from fire suppression. By estimate of the episode director – PF Primorsk Flotilla Commander Capt 1 rank Viktor Sokolov – servicemen have accomplished the task successfully, so months of crew training turned out to be quite fruitful.

The next episode of the exercise will be cruise missile firing drill from several directions. Surface ships, nuclear-powered submarines, coastal missile systems, and naval missile-carrying aviation will be involved in the drill.