The design and operation of the Ukrainian Fire Point FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile

The large-scale invasion launched by Russia on February 24, 2022, is now being met with a powerful Ukrainian weapon.

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In August 2025, Ukraine unveiled the Fire Point FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile, with a range of 3,000 kilometers which far exceeds the capabilities of Western missiles such as the American Tomahawk (2,500 km), the Franco-British Storm Shadow (550 km), and the German Taurus (500 km). The President of Ukraine indicated that mass production will begin this winter, with plans to manufacture 210 units per month.

Manufactured by the Ukrainian firm Fire Point, the FP-5 Flamingo missile bears a strong resemblance to the German V-1 flying bomb of World War II, a design already imitated by the Soviet Union with its Tu-141 and Tu-143 reconnaissance drones. The FP-5 takes off with the assistance of a rocket that detaches once in flight.

The missile has two small wings and four stabilizers on its tail. Once in flight, the FP-5 is powered by an Ivchenko AI-25 turbofan engine, a Soviet design from the 1960s of which more than 9,000 units were manufactured and which was used in various aircraft of the Soviet bloc, including the Czechoslovakian Aero L-39 Albatros trainer and the Soviet Yakovlev Yak-40 commercial airliner.

Fire Point obtained thousands of those old aircraft engines from a junkyard in Ukraine, leading some media outlets to claim that the FP-5 is a missile made from scrap metal. The warhead used by the FP-5 is a well-known American aerial bomb, the Mark 84, which carries 429 kg of Tritonal. It is a bomb with significant penetration power.

The FP-5 has a carbon fiber fuselage and is equipped with a GPS guidance system and an inertial navigation system, allowing it to fly at low altitudes and take advantage of terrain features to evade detection by Russian radar. It is a low-cost missile specifically designed to bypass Russian defenses and destroy targets at a great distance from the front, including military installations and oil refineries. If Ukraine achieves mass production, this missile could cripple Russia's economy and arms stores.

Ukraine first used these missiles in late August in an attack against Russian military installations in occupied Crimea. Yesterday, AiTelly published a video explaining the design and operation of this cruise missile:

And here you can see a video of an FP-5 being launched from a truck trailer, allowing this missile to be fired from mobile positions that are difficult to locate, as the Germans already did with the V-1:

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Main photo: Fire Point.