naraburns nihil supernum
1yr ago
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
Incorrect; I think you are thinking of thermobaric explosives which use a big charge to create a vacuum and subsequent very impressive shockwave.
Most airburst ap munitions have (relativly) not a lot of explosive force. What they do have is elventybajillion hypersonic fragments to fuck up squishy things. I don't know what the IDF uses; but some of them are even directional.
Any reasonable amount of high explosive would have smashed a lot more windows just from the shock wave. And if that didn't do it, those eleventy-bajillion hypersonic fragments in an anti-personnel airburst would have. That's why I scoffed about a grenade; it's the only way you're getting an airburst munition down to little enough damage. Though that would have been TOO small and wouldn't have resulted in the roof damage. The damage doesn't match that kind of explosive. There's blast damage, but it it looks to have been from a fairly low-detonation-pressure blast. And there's shrapnel, but not enough for an anti-personnel weapon large enough to have that kind of blast. There's heat damage; tires on cars not right at the epicenter are flat, probably from melting. Also the videos show a bright fireball. It looks to me like a fairly small, slow, explosion not far off the ground (perhaps at 2nd story level, directly over the most damaged cars) which spread some sort of burning substance. I don't know if Israel has weapons which match that pattern, but it doesn't seem unreasonable for a malfunctioning rocket.
The actual orgs doing the investigation have tentatively ruled out the misfired rocket idea 'cause of the direction and angle it came in from, but it's vague now.
Re. specifics: HE needs a pretty big volume to smash windows at a distance, specially in an open area. The shockwave just isn't that powerful when it detonates in the air. Fragments from a purpose built device are direcitonal, they all go down the bottom arc. It's probably not that though because we'd see photos of swisscheese side panels on cars and such
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Notes -
Airburst munitions don't leave much of a crater. The large fireball in the video further supports this type of weapon.
Airburst munitions would have blown out every window in the area.
Incorrect; I think you are thinking of thermobaric explosives which use a big charge to create a vacuum and subsequent very impressive shockwave.
Most airburst ap munitions have (relativly) not a lot of explosive force. What they do have is elventybajillion hypersonic fragments to fuck up squishy things. I don't know what the IDF uses; but some of them are even directional.
Any reasonable amount of high explosive would have smashed a lot more windows just from the shock wave. And if that didn't do it, those eleventy-bajillion hypersonic fragments in an anti-personnel airburst would have. That's why I scoffed about a grenade; it's the only way you're getting an airburst munition down to little enough damage. Though that would have been TOO small and wouldn't have resulted in the roof damage. The damage doesn't match that kind of explosive. There's blast damage, but it it looks to have been from a fairly low-detonation-pressure blast. And there's shrapnel, but not enough for an anti-personnel weapon large enough to have that kind of blast. There's heat damage; tires on cars not right at the epicenter are flat, probably from melting. Also the videos show a bright fireball. It looks to me like a fairly small, slow, explosion not far off the ground (perhaps at 2nd story level, directly over the most damaged cars) which spread some sort of burning substance. I don't know if Israel has weapons which match that pattern, but it doesn't seem unreasonable for a malfunctioning rocket.
We'll see.
The actual orgs doing the investigation have tentatively ruled out the misfired rocket idea 'cause of the direction and angle it came in from, but it's vague now.
Re. specifics: HE needs a pretty big volume to smash windows at a distance, specially in an open area. The shockwave just isn't that powerful when it detonates in the air. Fragments from a purpose built device are direcitonal, they all go down the bottom arc. It's probably not that though because we'd see photos of swisscheese side panels on cars and such
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Now you're suggesting a grenade?
No, most bombs are airburst. You don’t waste half your energy on the pavement unless you are trying to pierce a bunker.
I would not put much stake in amateur photo forensics.
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Behold! A JDAM (pictured on right) with a DSU-33 airburst fuse.
Yeah, it wasn't one of those either.
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