Now Ukraine ‘destroys £3million Russian T-90 tank’ 

Ukraine claims to have taken out another of Russia’s most-advanced tanks – this time using £400 rockets dropped from a home-made drone. 

Footage released by Aerorozvidka – Ukraine’s drone warfare unit – today shows two rockets being dropped on a tank which explode on top of it.

Aerorozvidka claim the tank was a £3million T-90 and was ‘destroyed’ in the attack, without saying exactly when or where the strike took place.

It comes just a day after more drone footage showed a £4million T-90M Russian tank being taken out by an £18,000 Swedish rocket launcher north of Kharkiv. 

‘Our fighters destroyed a Russian T-90 ‘Vladimir’ tank in the southern area of the front. We are still working to win,’ a YouTube post said.

Footage shows two rockets being dropped on the tank before exploding, with soldiers saying the attack happened somewhere on the ‘southern front’

Aerorozvidka has previously told how they are home-making combat drones using parts and money donated to them from overseas for use in combat.

Their drone – dubbed the R18 – costs ‘dozens of thousands of dollars’, spokesman Mykhailo told the Mirror last week, and is capable of carrying payloads up to 5kg.

He said the aircraft use Soviet-era rocket propelled grenades as improvised bombs, which they drop on targets from above.

Each of the bombs costs only around £400, according to Military Today.

The T-90 is Russia’s most-advanced tank, with the base model entering service in 1992 though production only ramped up in the late 2000s. 

The T-90M is the latest version of the tank, and entered service in 2016. 

Russia is thought to field around 1,000 of all T-90 variants, compared to around 5,000 T-72s – the tank the T-90 is based on and which has done the bulk of the fighting in Ukraine.

The T-90 is supposed to be one of the best tanks in the world, and has upgraded armour and missile protection systems compared to the T-72 which make it harder to destroy – at least in theory.

However, Russia is known to have lost at least one of the vehicles in fighting around Stary Saltiv, to the east of Kyiv, in recent weeks.

Footage released by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence shows the moment a Russian T-90M tank – a £4million latest-generation war machine – was blown up near Kharkiv

Ukraine claims its territorial defence troops destroyed the tank using a Swedish-made Carl Gustaf rocket launcher that costs just £18,000

Drone footage issued by Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence this week shows the T-90M exploding, which they say happened after a hit with a Carl Gustaf recoilless rifle. 

The ‘rifle’ is actually a Swedish-made rocket launcher that costs around £18,500, including the rocket.

More footage of the wreck suggests the rocket evaded the T-90’s advanced armour and defence systems by smashing through one of the wheels.

It then exploded inside the engine compartment, appearing to detonate ammunition along the way which produced a large blast – bending its armour plating outwards. 

Having recaptured Stary Saltiv from Putin’s troops on May 3,  Russia launched a failed counter-attack on May 5. This is thought to be the battle during which the tank was taken out.

Ukraine has now pushed beyond Stary Saltiv and is thought to have driven Russian forces back to their border in what would be another humiliating defeat.

Commanders said late Tuesday they had recaptured four small towns to the north of Ukraine’s second-largest city, with reports overnight suggesting they had pushed to within three miles of the Russian border.

If confirmed, it would put the city of Vovchans’k – a key supply hub linking Russia’s Belgorod to its frontlines in Donbas – within artillery range, threatening to cut supply lines and hamper Putin’s efforts to take the region.

The T-90M is Russia’s latest-generation battle tank, and only entered active service in 2016

Artillery can now almost certainly range that city, meaning Ukraine can at least disrupt and perhaps sever supply lines to the crucial frontline – slowing or stalling the Russian advance.

Retired US General Jack Keane, now working for the Institute for the Study of War think-tank, said Tuesday that he believes Russia is now having to divert forces from Donbas back to Kharkiv to secure the rear areas.

‘It just underscores the challenges they [the Russians] have,’ he said.

Similar Ukrainian counter-attacks were seen in the areas around Kyiv shortly before the Russian offensive ground to a halt and then turned into a retreat.

Russia is now more than two months into what was supposed to be a days-long war that was originally intended to topple the government and install a Moscow-friendly puppet regime.

But an attack on Kyiv from Belarus stuttered, stalled, and then turned into a humiliating retreat – forcing Russia to concentrate on taking Donbas instead.

Moscow confirmed its offensive in the region got underway on April 19 with a huge artillery barrage along a frontline stretching for hundreds of miles, followed by ground attacks that have inched forward into Ukrainian territory.

But there has been no major breakthrough of Ukrainian lines in the weeks since then, and Russia has gained no significant territory or seized any major cities.

Instead it has been dragged into brutal town-by-town fighting, with Kyiv saying it has suffered colossal losses.

The outcome of the Donbas fight is seen as key to the outcome of the war.