Ukraine Uses US-Supplied ADAM Anti-Personnel Landmines

Sharp-eyed open-source intelligence social (OSINT) bloggers spotted images posted on Ukraine’s 24th Mechanized Brigade social media sites that showed its artillery operators handling M692 155mm area-denial artillery munition (ADAM) carrier projectiles.

Each M692 carries 36 M67 anti-personnel landmines (APL), each round of which can rapidly deliver a 600 square meter (6,500 square feet) minefield out to a range of around 18 kilometers, which can be especially useful in disrupting Russian mass infantry “meat” attacks.

The area denial artillery munition (ADAM) 155mm delivery system and M67 anti-personnel landmine.

As Kyiv Post reported in November a $275 million package of military equipment under a Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) would, for the first time, include APL.

Further concrete evidence that the mines were being used were provided by images posted on pro-Russian social media sites that showed the APL deployed on the ground along with a video of a Russian military bomb disposal engineer eliminating one of the mines.

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Image posted by the “Engineer of the New Explosive World” milblogger showing an ADAM-delivered M67 APL

Once the mine lands, it launches seven six-meter (20-foot) long tripwires after which the mine arms itself. From then on, any disturbance of the tripwires will trigger the battery-operated detonation system.

The mine contains a spherical warhead containing 22 grams (0.8 ounces) of RDX-based explosive held in a cavity that is filled with 51 grams (1.8 ounces) of M10 liquid propellant. Once triggered, the warhead is fired upwards to a height of between one and two meters (3.3 to 6.6 feet), where it detonates, producing approximately 600 fragments that travel outwards at 900 meters per second (3,000 feet per second) and are lethal out to around 7 meters (23 feet).

The mines are designed to self-neutralize after a preset period of between 4 to 48 hours and will also become totally inactive after 14 days once the internal initiation battery discharges.

The November US support package also included other systems for landmine deployment, including the Modular Pack Mine System (M131 MOPMS) and the Volcano system, considerably increasing Ukraine’s range of defensive weapons.