Russia is about to unleash an unstoppable doomsday weapon which can dodge missile defences and cause an explosion big enough to wipe out a city.

Next year, a hypersonic ‘glider’ called Avangard will reportedly go into active service with the Red Banner Missile Division, which is based in the south Urals.

This terrifying weapon travels at 20 at times the speed of sound and can strike a target anywhere on Earth ‘like a meteorite’, according to Vladimir Putin.

The Russian President claimed his nation’s new missile is ‘invulnerable to any air or missile defence system’.

? Russian Defense Ministry press service/TASS More: http://tass.com/defense/1028303
A view of Russia’s new missile soaring into the air (Picture: Russian Defense Ministry)
epa06573474 A frame grab taken from a handout video footage provided by official website of Russian President kremlin.ru shows Avangard hypersonic vehicle with a new gliding hypersonic warhead blasting off in Russian territory in the video demonstrated on screens during Russian President Vladimir Putin's address to the Federal Assembly at the Manezh Central Exhibition Hall in Moscow, Russia, 01 March 2018. EPA/KREMLIN / HANDOUT HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES
The weapon will go into active service next year (Photo EPA/ Kremlin)

‘The scheduled period for placing the lead regiment on combat duty is the end of 2019. Initially, the regiment will comprise at least two systems but eventually their number will rise to their organic quantity of six units,’ a Russian defence industry source told TASS. 

The weapon is capable of carrying a 2 megaton nuclear warhead which is more than 100 times more powerful than the bomb which wiped out Hiroshima.

If dropped on London, it would cause a mile-wide fireball and kill vast numbers of people.

epa06573475 A frame grab taken from a handout video footage provided by official website of Russian President kremlin.ru shows a computer simulation of Avangard hypersonic vehicle with a gliding hypersonic warhead being released from booster rocket in the video demonstrated on screens during Russian President Vladimir Putin's address to the Federal Assembly at the Manezh Central Exhibition Hall in Moscow, Russia, 01 March 2018. EPA/KREMLIN / HANDOUT HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES
A computer simulation of a hypersonic nuclear warhead being released from a booster rocket (Photo: EPA/ Kremlin)

Avangard is a two-part system involving a large rocket and a gliding vehicle.

It works by using the missile to fly the glider high into the atmosphere, where it detaches and travels towards a target on the ground at hypersonic speeds.

The craft is capable of changing its direction as it travels and can reach such a high velocity that missile defences have no chance of stopping it.

Russia’s famous ‘Satan II’ missile can carry up to 24 Avangards, which means one fully-loaded nuke would have enough firepower to wipe out all the major cities in a country like the UK.

Putin unveiled Avangard this year along with various other new weapons including an underwater nuke designed to swamp coastal cities with huge radioactive tsunamis. 

This doomsday weapon is inspired by the experimental Soviet T-15 nuclear torpedo, which was dreamed up by the nuclear physicist Andrei Sakharov but never put into active service. If the T-15 had been built and unleashed it would produce a wave capable of washing a city like London or New York off the map and turn surrounding areas into an irradiated death zone.