Info EDUARD

Monthly magazine about history and scale plastic modeling.

Strana 25

AIR WAR IN UKRAINE

On Sunday, August 23, Ukraine‘s 414th Separate

Unmanned Systems Brigade carried out a drone attack

on the international airport in Anapa, Krasnodar Krai.

It hit several targets at once—a Sukhoi fighter aircraft,

probably a Su-30SM, a MiG-29K, and a large Orion

combat drone.

Ukrainian drones hit another MiG-29 the very

next night, into Monday, August 24, this time at the

Millerovo airbase in Russia‘s Rostov Oblast. In this

case, however, it was a decommissioned aircraft

that had been parked at the base for years. It did not

even catch fire after being hit. Instead, a helicopter

decoy that was struck during the same attack burned

down. The Ukrainians wasted a drone on this primitive

dummy...

A much more valuable target was hit by Ukrainian

drones on Friday, August 28, at the Engels-2 airbase

in Saratov Oblast. This airfield is home to Russian

strategic bombers that regularly launch cruise

missiles on Ukrainian cities. One Tu-95MS was

heavily damaged there when an explosion caused by

a Ukrainian drone tore off part of its wing. However,

the bomber had already been decommissioned at

the time, or was undergoing repairs—the satellite

imagery shows that its engines were missing.

On Sunday, August 30, Ukrainian drones returned to

the Millerovo airbase and were more successful this

time—they hit an ammunition depot, which burned

down. On the same day, the Yeysk airbase in Krasnodar

Krai and the Hvardiiske airbase in Crimea also came

under attack. At both locations, satellite imagery

confirmed several burned areas after the attacks,

but it was not possible to determine exactly what had

burned there. The Dzhankoi airbase in Crimea was

also hit, destroying an air-defense position.

The only accident mentioned during this period

occurred on Saturday, August 22, in Krasnodar Krai.

Near the village of Kalezh, an Mi-8MTV-1 helicopter

with registration number RF-32830, belonging to

Russia‘s Ministry of Emergency Situations, had to

make an emergency landing. The helicopter was

damaged during the hard landing.

Ukrainian Losses and Gains

On the Ukrainian side, there was one loss during

the period under review. It was also caused by an

accident, although it occurred during a combat

mission. On Monday, August 10, a Ukrainian

MiG-29 fighter was countering a Russian attack on the

Odesa region. However, one of the missiles exploded

directly beneath the fighter‘s wing at the moment it

was launched. The aircraft caught fire, the pilot lost

control of it, and had to eject. The causes of the missile

malfunction are being investigated.

Finally, a note on developments on the ground

battlefield. It is now possible to say that the Russian

summer offensive in Donetsk Oblast failed. Its

objective was to outflank the fortified belt around

the cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk from both

sides. The southern arm of the pincer was supposed

to advance from the city of Dobropillia, but it failed

to move. Although the situation there continues to

deteriorate for the defenders, the city has held out for

many months.

Russian efforts on the northern arm of the pincer

near the city of Lyman fared even worse. Although

Ukraine maintained a strict information blackout,

reports began emerging during the period under

review that the Ukrainians had not only stopped the

Russian offensive attempt there, but had crushed the

Russian forces and begun pushing them back. After

Russian military channels also acknowledged the

loss of territory near Lyman, the Ukrainians confirmed

that Operation Vivaldi was underway there, named

after the four seasons. This operation also has four

phases, and the liberation of villages north of Lyman

was only the first of them. Ground drones also played

a major role in this operation. We will certainly learn