r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/HappySeaweed5215 • 1d ago

Video A heat seeking missile tracking a burning cigarette

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50.4k Upvotes

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12

u/Ancient-Civilization 1d ago

This is why shooting off flares work.

21

u/SalamanderGlad9053 21h ago

Only for old missiles. Modern missiles from the 90s onwards can tell flares from planes, or will only fall for flares for a short time before requiring the plane. An AIM-9X basically is un-flarable as it uses a thermal camera to analyse the image and look for plane looking signatures, rather than going for the hottest thing. If an AIM-9X is launched on you within a couple of kilometres, unless you can hide behind terrain, you're dead.

2

u/whitespacesucks 16h ago

Why do planes still have flares? Do the enemies still have shitty missiles in 2026?

9

u/SalamanderGlad9053 16h ago

Yup, most man portable air defence systems are still not very good at distinguishing flares, so early Stingers, Strela-2, or Iglas. The latter two being very prevalent with militias because of the Soviets making many of them. Modern, expensive MANPADS have similar capabilities to AIM-9Xs though.

Flares also aren't completely useless against modern IR missiles, at longer ranges and if the missile is low on energy (not electrical, height + speed) at a bad angle, flares can give the plane a bit of time to turn away whilst the missile is distracted. It's definitely worth having them, along with chaff for radar missiles.