The NIP-16 site in Crimea could help Russian forces communicate with their satellites.

On Sunday, the Ukrainian army fired at least four American-made Army Tactical Missile System precision rockets at NIP-16. Fires raged at the site through the night, and Planet satellite imagery from Monday seems to depict blast marks on the ground at the sprawling base.

Scientists surely would cringe at any damage to NIP-16 and its suite of hard-to-replace scientific instruments. Thousands of Soviet naval conscripts built the installation at a time when governments were pouring massive resources into space exploration.

  • JucheBot1988@lemmygrad.ml
    0·
    5 months ago

    NIP-16’s builders cobbled the hardware together from old railroad bridges, the hulls of decommissioned submarines and the rotating mechanism from a scrapped battleship.

    If the US or one of its allies had built it a satellite station that way, you can bet the article would be talking about “recycling,” “earth-friendly building techniques,” “innovative use of former military hardware.”