Close call: This Is What It Looks Like When An Attack Helicopter Fires At You.

The following video is pretty scary: it shows a Ka-52 Alligator attack helicopter accidentally firing rockets towards parked cars and bystanders.

The Kamov Ka-52 Alligator is an all-weather attack helicopter featuring the distinctive coaxial rotor system of the Kamov design bureau. The footage shows two such gunship helicopters approaching what is probably a range, where a group of several cars is parked. Then, suddenly, one of the helicopters fires a rocket at a nearby object almost hitting the cameraman.

According to some sources, the clip, that leaked online on Sept. 19, was allegedly filmed during the ongoing Zapad 2017 drills; however the Russian military denied the claims that spread through the social media and, while not saying when and where it happened, it said the incident happened during another exercise.

“All the reports on social media about a barrage of rockets hitting a crowd of journalist and a large number of casualties are either a deliberate provocation or someone’s personal stupidity,” an official statement reported by RT said.

A public intelligence source cites one of the missiles on the KA-52 as being the Vikhr anti-armor missile and reports that the missiles are, “Virtually jam-proof and the system features automatic guidance to target.” The Kamov KA-52 also carries unguided High Velocity Aircraft Rockets (HVAR’s) of both the S-13 122mm rocket and the smaller S-8 80mm rocket both launched from multiple-round rocket pods. It is not known which munition was discharged in this incident.

H/T Dawid Szczesniak for the heads-up