HISTORY

Mission:

Impossible

Ukrainian

style

Text: Miro Barič

The Azovstal steelworks were shelled for several months.

The port city of Mariupol in the south of Ukraine was a target of shelling on February 24, the first day of the Russian aggression. The city

was surrounded by the Russian troops on March 2nd. More than two

months of street fighting followed. The Ukrainian soldiers in the city

were not completely isolated though. To supply them, and evacuate

the wounded the Ukrainian AF completed seven secret missions where the helicopter pilots flew more than 100 km over the enemy-held

territory at night and only several meters above the ground.

The first of total seven evacuation flights took

place on March 21. The last mission took place

on either April 5 or 7, depending on the source.

It was stated previously that the last flight to

Mariupol took place a month later, sometime

in the beginning of May. This is hardly probable

though. In the beginning of April the Ukrainian

troops still controlled the large areas of the

city. By the middle of the month however they

had to retreat into two large industrial complexes – steelworks Ilyich and Azovstal. In the

second half of April the Ukrainian soldiers only

stood defense in the second factory. It’s virtually impossible that a flight to Azovstal under

such circumstances would have escaped the

attackers‘ attention and did not draw their artillery fire.

The missions were flown under the utmost

secrecy and the participants were allowed to

speak to media only after the very last defenders of Mariupol surrendered in the second

half of May. Even though the world’s audience learned about many of these heroic deeds

the precise details about the places and times,

where from and when the evacuation flights

took place remained widely unknow up until

now.

One of the most detailed and therefore most

valuable testimonies came from the member

of the Ukrainian defense intelligence, code named Flint, who not only participated in the first

mission but also had taken part in its preparation from the beginning. The plan was a brain

child of General Major Kyryl Budanov, chief of

the defense intelligence. The first flight was

supposed to sortie before March 21 but had to

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INFO Eduard

be postponed three times due to the various

reasons. One of them was the intelligence information about the Russian AA defense along

the route to Mariupol which changed constantly. The Russians may have „sensed something“

since the concentration of the enemy’s air force over the besieged city suddently increased.

Another reason was the effort to keep the mission top secret. The flight was being prepared

at Dnipro airbase and a lot of people took part

in it – technicians, refuelling personnel, military police... There was clearly an increased

traffic of people and had the enemy had his

„eyes“ nearby they could not have missed that

the operation was getting ready. Therefore

even before the actual mission, in the order

to camouflage the events the desinformation

operation was implemented. „A soldier called

his wife and told her he will be home soon

because the upper command cancelled the

planned operation. And I had the conversation

with some one and told him the operation was

cancelled“ stated Flint for the on-line magazine The War Zone. After these information were

released the participants in the first flight returned to the airport, loaded the helicopters

and departed in a fake direction to conceal the

actual course. The third problem to overcome

before the mission was to find the pilots willing to fly it. Several pilots who were approached turned down the offer. „They thought it

was impossible“ said Flint. Finally they found

the first pilot who was willing to fly to Mariupol – due to the personal reasons. „His wife

was a military nurse in Azovstal. She cared for

the seriously wounded soldiers. The main mission objective was to evacuate these gravely

wounded soldiers and herself from that factory“ stated Flint.

In civilian clothing and unarmed

Before the flight all dressed into civilian clothing and removed all military identifications.

In case of a crash that would help them cross

the front line back to the Ukrainian territory

unnoticed. They also removed all the armament and equipment from the helicopters in

order to reduce weight as much as possible.

They made room for the cargo of the anti-tank

missiles NLAW and Javelin, AA rockets Stinger

and satellite communication systems Starlink.

Loading a wounded man into a Ukrainian Mi-8 helicopter at a pre-war exercise.

September 2022