The legendary FIM-92 Stinger portable anti-aircraft missile system helps our Armed Forces of Ukraine
to effectively fight against airborne threats and other russian fascist targets.
FIM-92 Stinger missiles belong to the category of MPADS.
Light, mobile, they can be operated by even one person (or formally two), they are extremely
effective and dangerous weapons in the fight against enemy aircraft.
These complexes were first used during the Falklands War, but became widely known thanks
to the Taliban, which used them to shoot down Soviet aircraft.
Thus was born the legend – the FIM-92 Stinger.
Who produces FIM-92 Stinger?
FIM-92 Stinger was developed and manufactured by General
Dynamics of the United States.
This is the same corporation that now produces the M1A2 Abrams tanks, which are in service
with the United States and its NATO partners.
Currently, Raytheon is responsible for the production of missiles.
The Stinger rocket engine was developed by Aerojet Rocketdyne, a well-known rocket engine
company.
There have even been rumors that the company is about to be bought by an American arms
giant Lockheed Martin, which supplies F-35 aircraft.
However, in February this year, the agreement was canceled due to restrictions by the local
market regulator.
What’s inside Stinger missile?
The FIM-92 Stinger missile itself consists of several basic elements: a section with
a homing head in front of the missile, a warhead, a propulsion section and a control section.
Two engines are used to launch the rocket.
Launcher, a small rocket engine allows the rocket to leave the container in which it
is stored, and move away to a safe distance from the operator.
Then comes the main two-stage Stinger propulsion engine to accelerate the missile to its cruising
speed and support it throughout the flight.
The FIM-92 Stinger launcher includes an operator’s handle and a trigger, as well as ‘friend-or-foe’
recognition system and a so-called BCU, or battery coolant unit.
This ensures that the homing head will be cooled immediately before take-off and the
entire system will receive the necessary energy.
If it does not switch on within 45 seconds, the operator must replace the BCU with a new
one.
What was FIM-92 Stinger made for?
As you can guess, FIM-92 Stinger missiles were developed as a successor to previously
used systems of this type.
After the significant success of the FIM-43 Redeye, General Dynamics decided to improve
its product and develop a new, improved hand-held surface-to-air missile.
Portable missile systems are the lowest level of air defense, and in the case of infantry,
they are basically the last resort to help destroy not only the enemy’s manpower, but
also its support vehicles.
The light weight of the whole complex allows one soldier to carry it and use it at a critical
moment for the military unit.
The FIM-92 Stinger missile, launched at the right moment by a properly trained operator,
is actually very difficult to counter even by modern aircraft.
If the operator attacks, for example, a helicopter and does so from a relatively close distance,
the crew of such an aircraft has almost no chance, because the protection systems installed
on board will have very little time to react.
Stingers are especially useful in advanced positions or during maneuver warfare, when
the main air defense systems are insufficient, or they were not deployed in time.
How does FIM-92 Stinger missile work?
As it was already mentioned, the FIM-92 Stinger is usually a surface-to-air missile, which
belongs to the passive class of missiles.
The infrared head used on the projectile is able to capture the heat source to which the
operator directs it.
After firing, the missile moves to the captured object, aiming at the specified source of
heat radiation.
Because Stingers are fired shoot mainly at airplanes and helicopters, the source of heat
of which is the engine, or the exhaust injectors of the engines in particular, because that’s
where a lot of heat energy is released directly into the atmosphere.
This greatly facilitates the operation of the missile system.
The Stinger system is passive, as mentioned above, thus it itself has no radiation that
could be captured by the onboard protection systems of the aircraft or helicopter.
This is a ‘fire-and-firget’ system – thanks to this, the operator only has to lock the
target, launch a missile and can immediately proceed to further action, because the missile
will do the rest on its own.
In order to avoid friendly fire, FIM-92 Stinger missiles are able to communicate with aircraft’s
friend-or-foe systems, and before firing, the operator already knows whether he is dealing
with friendly or an enemy vehicle.
An effective control system can correctly calculate the trajectory of a missile, which
helps to hit a moving maneuvering target.
Russian MiG, SU and TU aircraft’s signatures have ‘special’ status, which makes them
almost automatically recognized by the missile system as foe.
In the last stage of reaching the target, the system software shifts the aiming point
from the heat source closer to the center of the target to maximize the effectiveness
of a relatively small warhead.
Stinger missile modifications
Modifications of the FIM-92 Stinger missile are still being developed, although their
service life has expired.
The United States is currently working on a successor to this type of missile.
In the latest version, introduced in 2019, the Stingers received a proximity fuse that
allows them to hit smaller targets such as drones.
This is not an isolated concept, as a similar working model has also been used for APKWS
missiles.
The basic version of the Stinger is version A, which uses a passive infrared air target
finder, however, it can be misled by thermal traps (torches).
Therefore, in version B, it was changed to an IR / UV system, which was more difficult
to deceive.
In version C, the resistance to attempts to deceive the guidance system was further improved,
and there was also the ability to quickly download new software.
This allowed to update the data on known countermeasures.
In modification D, the fight against enemy deterrence systems was further developed.
Modification E improves the flight behavior of the projectile and its effectiveness against
small targets.
Modification F was a further development of modification E, bringing the improvements
already made to an even higher level.
The Ukrainian Armed Forces received the FIM-92 Stinger in the penultimate version of E, which
proved its effectiveness in combat, successfully destroying enemy aircraft and helicopters.
Sometimes it seems that russian pilots are afraid of the FIM-92 Stinger anti-aircraft
system at the genetic level, so russia has even made threats and warnings to the United
States over the supply of the famous anti-aircraft missile system to Ukraine.
This clearly gives reason to say that russians are afraid of the Stingers.
Why are FIM-92 Stinger shipments important to us?
There was a lot of talk before and now during the war, do we need FIM-92 Stingers?
We definitely do.
We all understand that the occupants have an advantage in the air, which allows them,
sometimes with impunity, to bomb our towns and villages, bring in troops with the help
of helicopters and provide fire support to infantry.
But the deployment of the Stingers changed this situation.
Every day we hear about downed planes and helicopters.
I’m sure most of them were hit with FIM-92 Stinger MPADS.
The enemy must watch their backs even in the air and wait for a powerful shot.