A Russian recruit narrowly avoided a potentially deadly mishap when he lost control of a rocket launcher during training and fired the round into the ground at his own feet, according to dramatic footage of the drill.
The weapons exercise, posted Monday on a Ukrainian Telegram channel, shows the inexperienced trainee standing in an open field while preparing an RPG launcher.
As he tried to steady the weapon on his shoulder, the launcher appeared to slip forward and out of his control. Moments later, the rocket discharged and slammed into the dirt just inches from where he was standing.
The soldier was lucky: the projectile did not explode. Instead, it buried itself in the ground, kicking up a burst of dust and soil around the visibly rattled trainee.
Both the recruit and the person recording the training session quickly ran from the smoking missile. Such rockets are typically designed not to detonate until they have traveled a certain distance after launch.
Off camera, a man could be heard angrily scolding the stunned trainee in Russian, using expletives as the embarrassed recruit quietly adjusted his helmet after the blunder.
It was not immediately clear when or where the incident occurred.
Videos showing Russian recruits struggling with military equipment have repeatedly circulated online since the start of the war in Ukraine. Last month, a similar clip shared on social media appeared to show a soldier losing control of a machine gun turret before being thrown off a platform.
Much like with the RPG training session fumble, the tossed rookie nearly killed his instructor with the out-of-control weapon.
Russia has been losing more than 30,000 troops per month this year, surging past Moscow’s monthly recruitment rate of 27,000, according to the Center for Strategic International Studies think tank.
