For three months, the Ukrainian crew of a propeller-driven Yakovlev Yak-52 training plane has been hunting down, dogfighting with and shooting down—World War I style—Russian surveillance drones over Odesa Oblast in southern Ukraine.
The Russian military’s frustration with the Yak-52 and its shotgun-wielding back-seat gunner crested last week, as the trainer’s kills likely exceeded a dozen drones. “Isn’t it time to shoot him down?” one Russian blogger wrote.
But that’s easier said than done. Russian surface-to-air missiles might struggle to hit such a small target so far from Russian-occupied territory.
So Russian forces did the next best thing—they went after the Yak-52 on the ground at its base: Hydroport airfield in Odesa. On or before Monday, a Russian drone surveilled the airfield, pinpointing several parked Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles and hangars where the Yak-52 may have sheltered.
An Iskander ballistic missile streaked in, exploding between the drones and the hangars and sparking several fires. One analyst scrutinized video and satellite imagery and concluded that the Iskander damaged three drones and several hangars. The same attack, or a separate one, apparently also hit a nearby Ukrainian air defense battery.
It’s too soon to say whether the Yak-52 was in one of the damaged hangars. If the 1970s-vintage plane is gone, it went out at the peak of its effectiveness as a drone-killer.
“The Yak-52 flew over Odesa and with high efficiency shot down our reconnaissance UAVs for a week, causing laughter in some circles,” the Russian blogger wrote. “This has not been funny to UAV operators and us for a long time.”
It’s possible the Yak-52 escaped harm, of course. If it did, its crew still has some explaining to do. The training plane’s mission is to shoot down surveillance drones in order to prevent the Russians from spotting targets for Iskanders and other missiles.
But a Russian drone flew unmolested over Hydroport long enough to draw a bead on several valuable Ukrainian aircraft. Neither the Yak-52 nor the nearby air defense battery prevented the surveillance that led to the damaging Iskander strike.
In that sense, the Monday (or earlier) raid on Hydroport was just the latest in a long chain of failures by Ukrainian air defenses. For three days in a row starting on July 1, Russian drones flew over Ukrainian air bases, spotting targets for Iskanders. The Ukrainians lost at least three priceless fighter jets in those raids.
The Yak-52 drone-killer was supposed to help solve Ukraine’s air defense crisis. But the crisis continues—and the Yak-52 itself may be a victim.
Replacements are coming. The Ukrainian intelligence directorate has been training gunners to shoot down Russian drones from the passenger’s seat of locally-made Aeroprakt A-22 sport planes.
Sources:
1. The Dead District: https://x.com/TheDeadDistrict/status/1812503613178249357
2. Conflict Intelligence Team: https://notes.citeam.org/dispatch-july-15-17-2024
3. War Vehicle Tracker: https://x.com/WarVehicle/status/1812925816709521457
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