Video Shows Russian Air Defense Topple Over Minutes After Putin Warns NATO

As Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened missile strikes on NATO countries sending troops to Ukraine, a video emerged showing one of Russia's prized Pantsir missile systems overturning in the city of Sochi.

A military vehicle carrying Russia's prized Pantsir-C1 air defense system appeared to overturn as it took a hard right on a road in Sochi, where one of Putin's lavish residences is located.

The CCTV footage, published by the Crimean Wind Telegram channel, was watermarked with a time stamp dating the incident to today, Thursday, February 29.

Newsweek has reached out to the Russian defense ministry via email for comment.

The footage was published as Putin delivered an address to Russia's Federal Assembly, in which he threatened Western countries with retaliatory strikes and warned that there is a risk of a nuclear war breaking out.

His remarks came after French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday suggested that NATO members could send ground troops to Ukraine. Other NATO allies including the U.S. ruled out doing so after Macron's suggestion.

"[Western nations] must realize that we also have weapons that can hit targets on their territory. All this really threatens a conflict with the use of nuclear weapons and the destruction of civilization. Don't they get that?!" the Russian leader said.

"We remember the fate of those who once sent their forces to the territory of our country. But now the consequences for possible interventionists will be much more tragic," Putin added.

Russia's Pantsir-S1 self-propelled anti-aircraft gun and missile system, which is believed to be worth in the area of $15 million, has been used by the military throughout Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which he launched on February 24, 2022. The mobile, short-range system is designed for use against aircraft, cruise missiles, precision-guided munitions and for supporting other air defense units against larger strikes.

In another similar incident in 2023, a Russian commander was fined in December after he crashed a Pantsir into a railway bridge in St. Petersburg months earlier, damaging the missile system.

The St. Petersburg Garrison Military Court said the commander failed to fold down part of the equipment while driving under the railway bridge on the city's Pulkovskoe Highway, and hit him with a fine of 50,000 rubles ($541), and was ordered to pay about 14 million rubles ($151,500) in damages.

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