(KYIV, UKRAINE) – Ukraine’s long range Flamingo cruise missile costs six times less than the American Tomahawk, the head of manufacturer Fire Point has said, as the country rapidly expands its domestic precision strike capability.
Each Flamingo missile carries 1,150 kilogrammes of explosives, enough to penetrate concrete walls, and is priced just below 600,000 US dollars, equivalent to about 467,000 British pounds or roughly 552,000 euros. The American Tomahawk costs approximately 3.5 million US dollars. The figures were given by Fire Point’s chief executive Iryna Terekh in an interview with The Guardian.
The Flamingo was used in June to strike a Russian military components factory in Cheboksary, located more than 950 kilometres from Kharkiv. The actual flight path was far longer. Terekh said the mission registered one of the longest distances ever recorded for a cruise missile mission, around 1,800 kilometres, due to the complexity of the trajectory.
Fire Point also produces long range drones. The lighter FP-1 unmanned aircraft, with a range exceeding 1,600 kilometres, has been used against less protected Russian oil refineries. Those strikes have cut Russian refining output by 20 percent and led to long queues at fuel stations, Terekh said. Each FP-1 costs between 55,000 and 75,000 US dollars, which is between roughly 42,800 and 58,400 British pounds, or about 50,600 to 69,000 euros.
The company now operates across 83 plants in Ukraine and one in Denmark. Total headcount has reached 6,000 people, up from 3,500 at the end of last year.
Fire Point is also developing Ukraine’s first ballistic missiles. Terekh said she hopes these will be launched before the end of this year. A short range ballistic missile variant, the FP-7, will form the basis of a separate initiative named Freya, an international effort involving Ukraine and nine other European countries. The project aims to build an alternative to the American Patriot air defence system. Fire Point will manufacture launchers and interceptor missiles, with a target cost of 1 million US dollars per interceptor, equal to about 778,000 British pounds or roughly 920,000 euros.
Terekh stated that she was not aware of any long range attack carried out in recent months that did not use Fire Point products.
On 24 July, Flamingo FP-5 cruise missiles struck the AVITEK military plant in Kirov, a Russian city located 1,200 kilometres from the Ukrainian border.