Ukrainian AN-124 Transported Unexpected Military Cargo From Israel To Georgia

This has not been publicly reported previously.

A Ukrainian An-124 Ruslan aircraft carried an unexpected cargo from Israel to Georgia - three launchers of the Spyder surface-to-air missile system. As "Militar" notes, Georgia's purchase of new air defense systems has not been publicly reported earlier.

It is noted that military observer Arab-Military of the social network X released a video of the truck loading into the An-124 at Israel's Ben-Gurion airport in Tel Aviv. Subsequently, images from the airport terminal were published, showing three Spyder SAM launchers being prepared for loading.

At the same time, given information from civil aviation monitoring services, after leaving Israel, the cargo plane traveled to Georgia, where it landed at Tbilisi International Airport.

What is known about the Spyder in Georgia

According to Militarny, Georgia purchased one battery of the Spyder-SR short-range surface-to-air missile system from Rafael in 2008. The Spyder SAM system is a mobile all-weather short-range air defense system designed to detect and destroy strike aircraft, bombers, cruise missiles, drones and precision air weapons.

Spyder-SR uses Python 5 and Derby air-to-air missiles as anti-aircraft missiles and has a claimed target interception range of up to 20 kilometers.

In addition, in March 2020, it was reported that Georgia planned to conduct a complete repair and upgrade of previously acquired anti-aircraft missile systems. The scope of the upgrade was not announced, however, according to unconfirmed information, it was planned to upgrade the Spyder-SR SAMs to the MR version. This would extend the kill zone to 40 kilometers. The purchase of new air defense systems by Georgia has not been publicly reported.

It is also noted that given the wheelbase of the vehicles in the published photos - 6×6, An-124 carried three launchers of Spyder-SR or MR SAMs, because the versions with a longer range are made on an 8×8 chassis.

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