HISTORY

In addition to the national markings the marking of the

military intelligence air force was added to the nose

of the aircraft.

The military intelligence released the images

from the training on Black Hawk.

Croatia was mentioned the first time in November

2022 and they are not in Ukraine yet, even though

the talks resumed recently. However, Ukraine is

already flying Sea King and Black Hawk helicopter

which deliveries we mentioned in the previous

articles of this series. Black Hawk is an upgrade

of the older model UH-60A and was received

by the military intelligence. So far, a video was

published supposedly showing the special units’

training with this helicopter. Sea King’s history

is even more interesting. Two of them have been

delivered so far, the third aircraft was still in

Britain at the time of this article release. It has

been several year the helicopters were stuck of

charge from the Royal Navy so they needed to be

commissioned again. BBC journalists spoke with

two Ukrainian technicians who had trained for

maintenance of this type for seven months and

they were very satisfied with the it.

As per their account very little remains from the

original equipment as most of the components

were upgraded. Even more interesting, the BBC

report was made on board of one the Sea Kings

which is already in Ukraine. It appears that these

aircraft had served in 1982 during the Falklands

War, therefore its Ukrainian crew is younger than

their helicopter! In addition, more than 40 years

ago it played an important part in the conflict.

Flown by the 820th Squadron commander, Ralph

Wykes-Sneyd, it flew through the storm to bring

the British ground forces commander, General

Jeremy Moore to Port Stanley to accept the

Argentinian surrender on June 14, 1982. No other

aircraft could make it through the storm at that

time. “It was very interesting operation,” retired

Rear Amiral Ralph Wykes-Sneyd told BBC. “The

armistice has not been signed yet so on our flight

to Stanley we not only faced the bad weather but

also several rather hostile Argentinians.

This helicopter, currently in Ukraine, had been

flown several times by Prince Andrew who in the

Falklands War served as a naval pilot. Speaking

about esteemed war veteran the Ukrainian

pilots highly praise Sea King. They say it’s easily

controllable in the difficult conditions, has a lot

of space, good payload and operational economy.

These helicopters fly the soldiers and supplies

missions, but their most important role is for the

search and rescue missions. That, according to

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INFO Eduard

its pilots, includes flying behind the enemy lines.

If the Ukrainian aircraft is hit and pilot has to

eject Sea King sometimes has to fly over the

territory which is not under Ukrainian control.

Ukrainian losses

As stated before, not all kills could have been

documented and more often than not are

confirmed after a long period of time (if confirmed

at all). During this reporting period there were

only two confirmed losses on the Ukrainian side

and in neither case it was necessary to cross

the frontline. On March 1, near Bakhmut, Su-24

bomber form the 7 Brigade of the Tactical AF was

shot down. Its crew, Lt. Col. Viktor Volynets and

Lt. Igor Solomenikov lost their lives. The flight

of Su-27 fighter, bort number “blue 30”, which

took off on March 27 at 10:20 pm from Myrghorod

in Poltave region, ended tragically. The pilot ws

Major Denys Kyrylyuk credited with 80 combat

missions in the defense of the motherland from

the Russian invasion. On March 28, at 12:45 am,

after intercepting Shahed-136 Iranian-made

drones he crashed at Tovkachivka village in

Tchernighyv region and was killed.

Images from the BBS documentary on Sea King helicopter deployment in Ukraine.

June 2023