Are you awake yet? Great! So you just got a young fighter's badge in cognition of modern pilotless means of aerial assault. You most likely know more than 1 active WP soldier. Not that they don't learn. But not refreshed cognition tends to become a passive component of the air and falls into the hay of the distance.
All right. Now a fewer more words about what a typical weekly air strike looks like utilizing 400 or 600 means of flying assault.
In the first place, lures and Szachida (also in the Geran 2 improvement variant – a warhead of about 90 kg, higher velocity and better guidance) start somewhere from border areas. We consider that their maximum scope is up to 2,000 km, and the average cruising velocity is 160-180 km/h.
Their way can be very strange. They can fly over Belarus to the Polish border and make a turn north, then turn east again and turn west. There's nothing standing in the way of them moving from any units of the Baltic fleet and flying by the sea, causing frustration in a satellite interview.
nevertheless they fly to each another and wherever they fly, no substance in which groups and how many waves, their primary goal is to take anti-aircraft defence at delicate moments erstwhile maneuvering and ballistic missiles appear above the final target. The Shahid flight will last for hours. They'll be known in advance. But no one's going to make an alarm in your city just due to the fact that 100 Shahids went up at Kursk. With the alarm, you gotta wait until they're tens of miles from the target. You can't keep people in shelters after a twelve hours.
The next phase of improvement of the attack is the launch of strategical bombers capable of firing maneuvering missiles. These are Tu 142, in operational Natowski coding called "bears" (bear). So if there is information in social media about the start of Shahids and then the emergence of "tush" or "bears" in more than a few, then something thicker is going on.
These first 2 stages of the attack will take place in the evening. The Federation army wages a humane war, so it beats industrial zones of cities usually at night erstwhile there aren't many people there. Remember that coordinating drones and a twelve bombers taking off from different locations in Russia, frequently separated by thousands of kilometres is simply a logistical masterpiece and takes time.
In addition, information may appear on launch missiles from submarines in the Atlantic. Why the Atlantic? I do not think that the Federation Navy, following the bitter experiences of the Black Sea War, where it was virtually defeated by the unincorporated Ukrainian fleet, will decide to operate on any interior NATO puddle that became the Baltic Sea after accession to Sweden and Finland.
phase 3 is ballistics. From ships, mobile launchers, silos, possibly aircraft (there are ballistic missiles that only take off from aircraft, specified as the Farunian Kindrazi road, which is reported to be expanding up to 12,000 km/h, yes, yes – mach 10 – about $10 million per piece).
That's where the jokes end. In the country there is already a conflict against the unusual routes of the Shahids and their accompanying lures. Manoeuvring missiles have already been launched and are approaching the borders. Ballistics and hypersonics (the mentioned Kindzarz – but don't number on it all week, is terribly costly and the Federation can produce just a fewer pieces of this miracle method within a month) will be at their destination in a twelve minutes.
At this point, air-raid sirens are being activated in various regions of the country. If there is simply a hazard of hypersonic attack (Kindzale, Circus, Onyks), sirens will roar throughout the country as shortly as the airlift carrying these Mig 31K and Su-34 aircraft rockets. There will be only a fewer minutes between their launch and the accomplishment of the target, so the alarm throughout the country is after the launch of these aircraft from the bases where the rockets are kept. These are possibly the most frustrating alarms called contemptible "mig has risen". They usually end after a twelve minutes, due to the fact that as he went up, so he landed without firing anything. You can have this 3 in a day. And take it here and work while you run to the shelter all 2 hours due to the fact that “mig has risen.” It is part of intellectual and economical warfare. Mig rose – the country stands for half an hour.
Okay. Sirens are out, Shahids are out in the country, winged rockets are flying, and in the Atlantic, the gaps of a submarine equipped with Kinjals have opened. Fighters and helicopters are flying through the sky. The first ones hunt what they can, the second 1 mainly for Shahids and decoys, due to the fact that that's the only thing he can hunt, so realistically judging, a helicopter.
At this point I will only mention that 2 of the 3 F-16 fighters lost so far in Ukraine were lost in incidents with the Shahids. Specifically, in incidents involving the fact that parts after the broken Shahida were sucked by a fighter engine, which led (two times) to their disaster. A pilot was besides killed in the second.
Of course, the rules of the fighter air combat with the drone are not to shoot a drone from a cannon that is the weapon of the nearest contact. But explain this to a pilot who has already fired from a fewer rockets at his disposal in the fight fervor, and on the radar he has dozens of targets, he can effectively disable from the cannon. With a certain amount of risk.
On December 13, 2024, Ukrainian pilot F-16 shot down six maneuvering rockets during 1 mission, including 2 of the deck cannon. It's a historical record. Even Americans let their pilots to destruct onboard guns only during simulator training. due to the fact that the hazard of specified an operation is besides high.
More specifically, the hazard is that Shahid costs about $22,000, while even an old and poorly equipped F-16 fighter is simply a cost of about $70 million. Seventy million dollars against twenty-two thousand! The training of pilot F-16 is – bagatela – about $5 million and respective years. Any staff accountant will tell you that you don't fire a cannon at Shahid. However, it is not the accountants who are behind the F-16. But you know what? I surely hope that our boys in case They won't be hunting October drones utilizing hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of equipment and risking their lives.
I met a Polish pilot, F-16, at a gas station. This gentleman offered a warrant of stableness in decisions taken under pressure. He looked like 50 years. And no, he wouldn't let me do a stupid selfie with him (because I'd most likely throw them out here, ha!). That's professional.
This professionalism carries 2 information for you. The first is good – men are watching over you, not children from the cult “Top Gun”. The another one's bad. For for you, this means that at least 20-30 of these 300 armed Shahids will penetrate our air defence and approach the designated (or accidental) points of impact. The attack on Poland at night from 9 to 10 September 2025 proves that of the possible 300 Sachids utilized it can scope the targets and 150 pieces. Unfortunately, we have statistics, and that's the reality. Poland does not fight Russia all day like Ukraine, so the first attack will be alternatively devastating. It will be specified a fresh Pearl Harbour, no substance how safe our politicians and military experts are. There's gonna be any rockets. And the building that Shahid infected looks like it's photograph 16.
Fig. 16. Kiev office building struck by a drone in the Szahid family, June 2025 [photo: own].
So we're at the point where the sirens are howling, the Shahid engines will shortly be snarling over their heads, and the air will be filled with sounds of a series of dense device guns (they bow to the accountant again – it's the cheapest means of fighting drones) and explosions of anti-aircraft defence missiles.
What do I do? How do you behave? Are you awake yet? Good! Here, the theoretical lecture turns into applicable aspects of the communicative about how to deal with a reality that can take place in any Polish city. And believe me, this applicable lecture is based on 3 years of my weekly experience with life under raids. Heads up! This can be handled and any good practices applied that will increase your safety and let you to function as usually as possible. due to the fact that you can't physically sit in a basement for 2 days a week in the long run. This needs to be rationalized.
The first of the conclusions drawn a small earlier about the situation of the air raid utilizing drones and rockets was the conclusion that there is no safe place in the affected country specified as Ukraine or Poland in practice. Do you begin to realize why, after 3 years on my phone, an anti-aircraft alarm inactive sounds with the words "Oh fucking rocket!"? due to the fact that this fucking rocket, though one, is always going somewhere. And it's not a fresh Year's fireworks show. This is simply a deadly game of cat and mouse with a chance of losing possibly 1 in a million but inactive existing. Oh, fucking rocket... Fuck off or not fuck off? That's the question.
In order to effectively hide in the air strike, something should be available to meet the requirements of the building, which is simply a protective structure. For years in Poland, anti-aircraft shelters were a subject from the border of discipline fiction. Like the functioning of civilian protection. Fortunately, the conflict in Ukraine highlighted how unprepared we are as a country and society in terms of having a adequate number of modern protective structures and, at least, from the legal side, something began to happen, as demonstrated by the fresh legal acts mentioned in the footnote.
In the "Press kit" (a charming name – yes, by 3 "s" – this better not be a quality omen) prepared by the Ministry of abroad Affairs and entitled "The civilian Protection and civilian Protection Act" we can read, among another things: The law developed at the Ministry of abroad Affairs creates a comprehensive civilian protection and defence strategy both during peace and during war. Okay, possibly the bill creates a comprehensive civilian protection system. But the bill doesn't make shelters. Good, monolithic, reinforced concrete shelters, without windows, profoundly dug into the ground, with vestibules, 2 entrances in which all citizen of our country at the time of the anti-aircraft alarm will find a minimum of 1 square metre (bene note, this request will most likely only let him to stand and faint standing after a fewer hours of an ongoing alarm).
All right. So you can safely presume that you do not have a building close your place of residence that meets the requirements of a protective structure. So if you want to "fuck off," you don't know where. What to do? Don't panic. Let us look at the legal requirements to be met by protective structures (1), which will let you to determine, although roughly, what objects in your surroundings may be a substitute.
The Regulation of the Ministry of abroad Affairs on criteria for the designation of construction sites or their parts as protective structures, mentioned in the footnote, sets rather clear requirements for shelters. The protection may be the building that protects against:
1. the effects of natural disasters caused by strong winds, including windstorms, storms, storms and whirlwinds,
2. shards of ammunition, including bombs, missiles and grenades, and fire from small-caliber weapons,
3. loads caused by grouting and falling elements of construction and equipment,
3. radiation penetrating gamma from radioactive fallout,
4. long-term impact of the external fire on the protective structure,
5. the impact of the blast wave,
6. contamination of the interior environment in the structure by chemical, biological or radioactive agents,
7. shock affecting the plan and equipment of the protective structure.
The horse, I'm sorry, the shelter, everyone sees. Well, it is not simple to describe in Polish the method requirements that a building building should meet, for which markings in the field of physics and mathematics will work better. For this reason, the legislator goes further to dry numbers, dividing the shelters described above into categories S-0 to S-3 (where S-0 is the weakest), in which the division of the criterion determining the shelter's ability to last the shock wave with a certain force. The weakest of the shelters is to withstand a shock wave of at least 60 kN/m2 or a force of at least 0.03 MPa, the strongest – at least 300 kN/m2 or a force of at least 0.3 MPa; what is the shock wave, where it lives and what properties it has, will be a small further away. For now you should know (and remember this well) that in the event of participation in the detonation it is the shock wave that should be feared most – it is she who knocks out the windows, rips the walls, and hugs everyone around with a immense power.
In addition to shelters, there is simply a category of objects in the regulations (and life) called "coveries". They are not as resistant as shelters and are divided into 3 classes from U-1 to U-3. The U-1 class is intended to supply shelter from the phenomena mentioned in points 1-3, U-2 from points 1-5 and U-3 from points 1-6. In addition, the cover-up of each class should comply with certain Regulations regarding fire and smoke opposition and grouting resistance.
Did the above talk shed light on your doubts about the nature and strength of the rooms you have at hand all day? You don't? That's very good. After all, it's discipline and normal, which is not easy. And if it falls into the shahid square or enters the rocket area, it's even harder. Hmm... And there were expected to be applicable tips and tricks. All right, time to go.
What is the home you live in made of? Is this a single-family building or a multi-story block? Does he have a basement or an underground garage? These are the basic questions that depend on the optimal way you handle an anti-aircraft alert erstwhile you actually only have a fewer minutes to implement any protective action.
You answer the questions above, I'll tell you what a shock wave is. The shock wave is 1 of the most destructive phenomena associated with explosives explosions. Not the shrapnel, not the incendiaries, but the shock wave, which is nothing more than a thin bubble of rapidly rising air force affecting anything in its path. Including a reinforced concrete wall 3 metres thick, most of the impact waves from the demolition measures described in this chapter will not pass (except for a direct ballistic rocket hit. And remember – concrete besides has different classes of quality and strength). It's not easy.
reasoning of the shock wave, imagine just specified a large soap bubble that arises, grows and cracks in fractions of a second. At the time of the explosion, a immense amount of hot gases with a powerful force are formed. They search to immediately escape into the environment in the form of this destructive bubble, additionally piling up the spirit of God with the guilty air (which is besides a mixture of gases, but with a unchangeable place in a given unit and time pressure).
With a TNT detonation (and this is the basis of most warheads), the first velocity of the impact wave is 6,900 m/s, or more than 20 wave (twenty times faster than sound). For imaging, it is simply a velocity of 6.9 km/s, so if there was no atmosphere (abstract entirely from the fact that without the atmosphere there is no combustion) that resists, elements of the shock wave at the detonation of the TNT would orbit the Earth's sphere in 96 minutes, which is just over an hr and a half. Not 80 days around the world, 90 minutes. Do you feel that power?
It is this fast increase in force associated with the expansion of gases created by the detonation that knocks over the walls of buildings and throws cars and people like dolls.
Behind the head of the wave is simply a low-pressure (lower than atmospheric) zone, which is perceived as a violent jolt toward the epicentre of the explosion. That's how physics works. If force rises rapidly and repeatedly in front of the wave, then a force gap must be behind it. For example, it can in a fraction of a second suck the air out of the area through which the impact wave's forehead passed. The effect of this vacuum is short-lived but nasty to surviving organisms. There's any force inside you, too, balanced by outside air pressure. And for a fraction of a second of that air, it's going to be diabolically lacking around you, which is you're in a literal vacuum, and your organs are blown from the inside, which completes the demolition work done by the force that crushed your head of the shock wave. Brr... what people won't figure out not to usage to kill a simple kitchen knife.
The distance of about 300 metres (in an environment without architectural obstacles) will overcome the shock wave at a TNT detonation in time from 0.3 to 0.6 seconds. And after 300 meters, it will inactive decision at a velocity higher than sound. It takes 0.3 seconds to blink.
Why did I mention 300 meters? due to the fact that at the detonation of 100 kg of TNT, the destructive scope of impact waves is now about 300 metres. A 100 kg of TNT is simply a better version of Shahid, or Geran 2 drone.
Remember, however, that the full above model and the calculations quoted are purely conceptual. In fact, the shock wave does not spread like a increasing soap bubble. Especially in urban areas. Along the way it meets the walls of buildings, protruding elements of the facade, tiny architecture objects – walls, dumpsters, worlds, lanterns – parked cars. All of this causes her reflections, weakness, nonlinearity (to be exact: non-sphericity). Even open windows in an even facade of the building influence the form and way of the impact wave. Ba! besides closed windows affect it. due to the fact that the shock wave, moving very quickly, can open the first windows in its path. besides the sites, which is theoretically non-opening windows.
Now, take another look at the building in photograph 16. Do you see the place where Shahid went? Right under the roof. He pulled any bricks and any part of the shock wave must have gotten inside. However, part of the impact wave momentum spread across the building facade. These windows didn't fall out alone. The warming of the elevation was besides removed by the spreading shock wave. In case you're wondering what these dark spots are on the façade, they're just mounting styrofoam mushrooms to the wall. The temperature produced by the detonation melted the plaster and revealed these mountings.
Okay. Now, let's put these 0.3 seconds of drama on the shelf.
At the time of the encounter of Shahid flying at about 180 km/h with the building wall there is an explosion. A fire-storming charge of about 100 kg is initiated. This is not just a TNT, but a secret of a company blend, whose task is not only to crush (as in the case of TNT), but besides to ignite the fire.
The energy of the detonation leads to the penetration of a brick wall, a thick one-and-a-half brick, and part (certainly large) of the storm-fire material enters the inside of the room. In the area with a radius of a fewer meters from the site of Shahid's encounter with the wall, there is complete destruction. The brick wall breaks down, the force is highly advanced there, fragments of the structure from this place are scattered by force of detonation within a radius of tens of meters from the place from which they "start". Being in this region is simply a death sentence. If not shrapnel or temperature and fire, the same force will suffice for drastic fractures and multiple organ injuries resulting in imminent death.
The death region ends about 20 meters from where it hit the wall. And it has a very irregular shape, it is not a sphere. The wall of the building provides rather good protection, and already respective meters below the level you can see a surviving window with windows.
announcement how many windows are missing on the level that Shahid entered. It's a shock wave that went inside the rooms on this floor, moving around, looking for a way out, and just broke the windows from the inside. The shock wave has it in itself, that erstwhile entering inside the building it spreads around the rooms and seeks to get out of them. usually in this case, windows, doors and gates fall prey to its destructive force as the weakest elements of the surface on which it exerts its impact wave pressure.
As unusual as it sounds, the shock wave itself does not origin a large mess in the rooms, erstwhile it has weakened somewhat in its destructive strength. She's just putting it all down nicely. I saw the area where after she passed everything lay in its places but the entrance gates that were opened, even though they were locked. The padlock looked like a picture. 17. Hardened steel bent like plasticine, and papers lying on the table where they were laid the erstwhile day.
photograph 17. The padlock opened forcefully by the shock wave. Distance from the impact point of the rocket maneuvering about 500 m in a consecutive line. The area is densely built. April 2025 [photo: own].
Let's go back to the detonation of our Shahid. Outside the death region (a fewer meters from the epicentre) to the distance of 100-150 meters, a serious harm region will appear. The spreading shock wave and flying elements of the broken structure will sow demolition and death if they have bad luck and stand improperly in their way. So it is better not to stand on this road without appropriate cover, and ideally – not to be on this road at all.
At 150-200 meters to 300-350 meters there will be a region of light harm (failure zone). Why bad luck? due to the fact that with bad luck, you can get a part of broken glass in the femoral or cervical artery in this area and bleed to death in minutes. With luck, 1 can only feel a strong gust and feel that everything around us flies. Including fragments of bricks, reinforcing rods and quite a few glass. My advice – do not effort to play Noah with the “Matrix” and act in the “bullet time” regime. May I remind you that the detonation will scope this area within 0.3 seconds of the explosion. That's in no time. Literally.
So, how do we accept specified natural circumstances? How to prepare, what to do? Well, it is time for you to answer these questions: What is the home you live in? Is this a single-family building or a multi-story block? Does he have a basement or an underground garage?
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Footnotes
(1) What is simply a protective building, which should meet the requirements, is governed primarily by the civilian Protection and civilian Protection Act of 5 December 2024 (Journal of Laws of 2024, item 1907) and the Regulation of the Minister of the Interior and Administration of 26 February 2025 on criteria for the designation of construction sites or their parts as protective structures (Journal of Laws of 2025, item 235).
