New High Explosive Incendiary Bomb Sighted In Syria

Thanks to Pieter Van Ostaeyen for sending me the following video

At first this looks like a FAB-500 M62, a high explosive bomb used by the Syrian Air Force since about October 2012, but two features point to this being another type of bomb.  First of all we get a glimpse inside the bomb

It appears to show a separator just before the second lug-hole, and as this cutaway of a FAB-500 M62 shows that's no present in the FAB-500 M62

The second clue is what's written on the bomb

It's very faint, but part of the lettering can be made out, and the first thing that points to it not being a FAB-500 M62 is that there's four letters, not three, before the dash, followed by the number 5.  The first letter is Ф, or F, the second is only partially visible, but the third letter is clearly an A, and the fourth is unclear.  The partially visible second letter matches the top of the Cyrillic letter З, which in the English alphabet is Z.  So we have "FZA_-5".  One visit to a Soviet weapon catalog later and I find a match for both what's written on the bomb and the unusual separator, the FZAB-500M, a high explosive incendiary bomb

You'll note that in the above image the separator for explosive and incendiary fill is positioned just behind the second lug-hole, exactly at shown in the video.  Previously only much smaller ZAB 100-105 incendiary bombs have been recorded in Syria, so this would be a significant increase in the size and power of incendiary bombs being used in the conflict.


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