Canada claims a Russian-made Tor-M1 missile hit a Ukrainian plane in Tehran on Wednesday
The Tor-M1 anti-aircraft defense system is displayed in a military parade to commemorate the anniversary of the start of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, in Tehran on September 22 2009. File Picture: REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi
It is designed to be mobile and lethal against targets at altitudes up to 6,000m and at ranges of 12km, according to the Federation of American Scientists, which researches and analyses “catastrophic threats to national and international security”. It was unlikely the flight crew had time to react to any missile, said Michael Duitsman, a research associate at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies.
Commercial air flights have transponders — radio transmitters that broadcast their identity, speed and altitude at an internationally agreed frequency. There were several other civilian aircraft nearby when Flight 752 crashed just a few kilometres from the airport. “Shooting down a hostile aircraft is easy,” said the officer, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue.Tor missiles are guided by radar and fly at almost three times the speed of sound. That means that if launched at a target 5km away, they will arrive within about five seconds.
Iran fields “small numbers” of Tor systems, the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a report in 2019.
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