Ukrainian special operators on Tuesday scored the first-ever-in-history kill of a manned aircraft by a long-range robot boat off Crimea’s western coast in the early morning hours.
Nighttime video from an onboard camera showed a Ukrainian Magura V5 naval drone moving through choppy seas at high speed and under fire from at least two circling Russian Mi-8 helicopters.
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Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (HUR) published the combat images and said the engagement took place near Cape Tarkhankut, the extreme western tip of Russian-occupied Crimea. At least one other boat is also visible, dodging Russian machine gun fire between splashes.
The HUR statement said the drones launched multiple R-73 SeeDragon missiles – a Soviet-era air-to-air missile modified by Ukraine for maritime use – and downed one Mi-8 helicopter before damaging a second, forcing it to flee.
The video shows two missile launches with one clear hit, and probable fire by a drone-mounted machine gun at the Russian choppers with unclear results.
HUR later published a purported recording of one of the Russian pilots reporting being hit by one of the seaborne anti-aircraft missiles.
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“There was an explosion and I was hit. The shot was from the sea. After that there was another flash. I already was too busy to see where that went. But the first one went straight at me and exploded somewhere nearby, and I could feel that some of the systems in the helicopter had failed,” the pilot reportedly said.
The damaged helicopter reportedly made it back to base. Russian milbloggers widely confirmed the engagement and shoot-down. Dva Mayora, a pro-Moscow military information Telegram channel with 1.2 million followers, criticized Russian air and naval leadership for failing to take defensive measures against a known threat.
“It is sad, but the tactics of using R-73 with MBEK [robot motor boats] have been known for several months. As can be seen in the footage previously taken from [the HUR video], machine guns from enemy surface platforms are also being used. The response speed [by Russian authorities] to new technological challenges is extremely low…
“We consider it extremely important to draw attention to the fact that [the Ukrainian military] has now received combat-tested means of protection against air threats of its ‘mosquito fleet,’” the posting says.
Russia’s Defense Ministry has yet to comment on the reports.
The HUR statement claimed the Russian helicopters flew into an ambush. In Ukraine’s previous naval drone attacks on Russian naval targets – both attempted and successful ones – a frequent Russian counter-tactic has been to launch helicopter gunships to hunt down and destroy the Ukrainian naval drones.
The battle off the Crimean shore took place amidst ongoing Ukrainian drone and missile strikes against land targets in the peninsula itself and Russia’s Kursk, Smolensk and Rostov regions. It was unclear if the Magura vs. Mi-8 sea battle was linked to those land strikes.
Prior to the Kremlin’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russian naval forces led by the Sevastopol-based Black Sea Fleet dominated Ukraine’s minuscule seapower-capable forces, the latter comprising only a handful of small patrol boats and anti-ship missile batteries.
Since then, Ukraine’s military and special operations forces have eliminated more than one-third of the vessels registered as elements of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet using home-grown and NATO state-donated weaponry.
The highest profile sinking was the Black Sea Fleet’s flagship Moskva in April 2022.
The most effective weapons used by the Ukrainians have been seaborne drones such as the Magura V5, which combines a low radar profile, high speed and a carrying capacity of up to half a ton of high explosives.
Britain and France-donated Storm Shadow/SCALP anti-ship missiles have also been used to destroy Russian warships.
The most successful Storm Shadow strike of the war thus far took place on Sept. 13, 2023, when a wave of precision-guided Storm Shadow missiles demolished a Russian missile-carrying submarine and heavy assault ship tied up in Sevastopol port.
What remained of the Black Sea Fleet began switching bases to the mainland port Novorossiysk, outside Storm Shadow range, in mid-October that year.
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