Threat types: what Russia attacks Ukraine with
Shahed drones, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles: each type flies at its own speed, so each leaves a different amount of time before it arrives — from several hours for a regular Shahed to a few minutes for a ballistic missile. Here is every threat type the Alarm Maps map shows, with the speed we use to compute its time to arrival.
Strike drones
-
The regular Shahed (Shahed-136, Geran-2) — a one-way attack drone with a piston engine and a propeller. Slow but the most numerous: it flies for hours and often changes course.
140 km/h100 km — 43 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
The jet-powered Shahed (Geran-3, Geran-4, Shahed-238) — the same kind of drone with a turbojet: twice as fast and flying higher.
340 km/h100 km — 18 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
Decoy drones (Gerbera, Parodiya) — cheap Shahed look-alikes with no warhead or a small one. They fly with the strike drones to overload air defence.
140 km/h100 km — 43 minSpeed and time to cities →
Cruise missiles and missile-drones
-
Banderol (S8000) — a small jet-powered cruise missile launched from Orion drones, helicopters and from the ground; it strikes mostly Odesa, Kharkiv and Kyiv.
450 km/h100 km — 13 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
The Kh-101 — a cruise missile fired by Tu-95MS and Tu-160 bombers, in 2026 mostly over the Caspian. Subsonic, flying low along a route; hours pass from launch to impact.
650 km/h100 km — 9 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
The Kalibr (3M-14) — a cruise missile fired from ships and submarines; in 2026 straight from the Novorossiysk harbour and from the Caspian Sea.
650 km/h100 km — 9 minSpeed and time to cities →
Supersonic missiles
-
The Oniks — a supersonic anti-ship missile fired from Bastion coastal systems in Crimea; it strikes mostly Odesa Oblast and skims the sea at 10–15 m.
2 750 km/h100 km — 2 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
The Kh-22 and Kh-32 — supersonic missiles from Tu-22M3 bombers with a warhead of almost a tonne; only Patriot can shoot them down. Rarely used in 2026.
2 750 km/h100 km — 2 minSpeed and time to cities →
-
Zircon and Oniks-M launched from land (Kursk, Bryansk oblasts) — channels report them as one weapon; they fly a quasi-ballistic path.
5 000 km/h100 km — 1 minSpeed and time to cities →
Ballistic missiles
-
Iskander-M, KN-23 and converted S-300/S-400 — they fly a ballistic arc; the alert often comes with only minutes to go.
8 000 km/h100 km — 45 sSpeed and time to cities →
-
Kinzhal (Kh-47M2) — a ballistic missile launched from a MiG-31K fighter. Because of it, the whole country is put on alert as soon as the plane takes off.
13 000 km/h100 km — 28 sSpeed and time to cities →
Comparison: how long each type flies
The times below are for a straight-line distance at the speed the map computes with. 300 km is roughly from the border with Bryansk or Kursk Oblast to Kyiv; 700 km is from Crimea or Rostov Oblast to western Ukraine.
| Threat type | Speed | 100 km | 300 km | 700 km |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shahed drones (Shahed-136/131) | 140 km/h | 43 min | 2 h 10 min | 5 h |
| Decoy drones (Gerbera, Parodiya) | 140 km/h | 43 min | 2 h 10 min | 5 h |
| Jet-powered Shahed drones (Shahed-238) | 340 km/h | 18 min | 53 min | 2 h 5 min |
| Banderol loitering munition (S8000) | 450 km/h | 13 min | 40 min | 1 h 35 min |
| Kh-101 cruise missile | 650 km/h | 9 min | 28 min | 1 h 5 min |
| Kalibr cruise missile | 650 km/h | 9 min | 28 min | 1 h 5 min |
| Oniks missile (P-800) | 2 750 km/h | 2 min | 7 min | 15 min |
| Kh-22 and Kh-32 missiles | 2 750 km/h | 2 min | 7 min | 15 min |
| Quasi-ballistic missiles (Zircon, Oniks-M) | 5 000 km/h | 1 min | 4 min | 8 min |
| Ballistic missiles (Iskander-M, KN-23) | 8 000 km/h | 45 s | 2 min | 5 min |
| Aeroballistic missiles (Kinzhal) | 13 000 km/h | 28 s | 1 min | 3 min |
For drones and cruise missiles this is not the top speed but the average along a real route, with loops and detours around air defence: that is how most of them fly. For the jet-powered Shahed it is measured to impact over 541 arrivals. For fast missiles it is computed, and the real time can be longer. Details on the Sources page.
Why the time to arrival differs so much
A slow drone and a ballistic missile differ by a factor of tens. A regular Shahed needs over two hours for 300 km: it shows up on the map long before it arrives, and there is time to get to a shelter. A cruise missile covers the same distance in under half an hour, and it flies low, so monitoring often spots it late. Ballistic missiles and the Kinzhal cover hundreds of kilometres in a few minutes — the alert for them is declared at launch, or even when the carrier takes off, and waiting until the missile "shows up" is not an option.
How to tell from a message what is flying
Ukrainian monitoring channels write briefly and in their own slang. Most often:
- «мопед» (moped), «шахед», «БпЛА» (UAV) — a strike drone. «реактив», «реактивний» — a jet-powered Shahed.
- «гербера», «пародія», «приманка» — a decoy drone with no warhead or a small one.
- «КР», «крилата», «Калібр», «Х-101» — a cruise missile. «Бандероль» — the S8000 missile-drone.
- «балістика», «швидкісна ціль» (fast target) — a ballistic missile; from the east and from Crimea it is most often an Iskander-M or a KN-23. A «fast target» from the sea is most likely a supersonic missile.
- «зліт МіГ-31К» (MiG-31K take-off) — a Kinzhal threat: there is no missile yet, but the whole country is already on alert.
The Alarm Maps map reads these messages automatically, places a marker of the right type and computes how many minutes are left until arrival. Open the map · what is in the air now
Frequently asked questions
Are the Shahed and the Geran the same thing?
Yes. The Shahed-136 is an Iranian strike drone; Geran-2 is the Russian name for its copy, made in Russia (at the Alabuga plant in Tatarstan). In Ukraine both are called "Shaheds" — the regular Shahed has its own page. The jet-powered versions, Geran-3 and Geran-4, descend from the Iranian Shahed-238 — see their own page.
Is the Banderol a missile or a drone?
Something in between. Ukraine's Defence Intelligence classifies the S8000 Banderol as a small cruise missile; the Air Force calls it a jet-powered loitering munition shaped like a cruise missile. It is launched from Orion drones, Mi-28 helicopters and from the ground, and flies at 520–560 km/h. The map computes its time to arrival with an effective speed of 450 km/h — the speed it makes along the route, not the nominal one. More on the Banderol page.
Is the Kinzhal a ballistic or a cruise missile?
Ballistic — more precisely, aeroballistic: a missile based on the Iskander, launched from a MiG-31K fighter. It flies a ballistic path rather than low over the ground like the Kalibr or the Kh-101 cruise missiles. More on the Kinzhal page.
What is a "fast target"?
That is how the Air Force and monitoring channels describe a missile much faster than a cruise missile when its type has not been named yet: most often a ballistic missile (Iskander-M, KN-23), and from the sea a supersonic one (Oniks). On the map it appears as ballistic or supersonic, depending on where it was launched from.
Updated .