A remarkable video has emerged, taken by a Russian fighter pilot after ejecting from his Flanker series jet, during the conflict in Ukraine. The footage joins a growing collection of air combat incidents captured on camera like never before by pilots on both sides of the war. Although it’s not exactly clear when or where the incident took place, it’s another reminder of the high-intensity air campaign being fought in and around Ukraine and the frequent life-or-death situations that the pilots involved face on a daily basis.
The video appears to have first been shared by Russian military blogger Kirill Fedorov on his War History Weapons account on the Telegram messaging app.
Shot entirely from the pilot’s perspective, the video begins above the clouds, showing the stricken fighter some distance below, in a flat spin toward the ground. At one point, one engine appears to be on fire. It’s not immediately clear what type of Flanker series fighter is involved, due to the distance from the camera and the relatively low quality.
The single-seat Su-35S multirole fighter, as well as the two-seat Su-30SM, and also the Su-34 Fullback, a Flanker-derivative strike aircraft, have all been widely used by Russia in the war in Ukraine. The Su-35S appears the most likely candidate in this instance, with no obvious signs of the broader ‘platypus’ forward fuselage of the Su-34, or the canard foreplanes found on both the Su-30SM and the Su-34. One other potential candidate is an older Su-27 fighter, of the kind that has seen more limited use in the fighting, based at Belbek in occupied Crimea.
The perspective then switches to a view of the pilot, as he descends below his typical orange and white parachute, visor still closed. His portable survival kit, including an undeployed life raft, for a landing in water, can also be seen below him. Around the midway point in the video, on reaching a lower altitude, the pilot is able to remove his oxygen mask, raises his visor, and begins to address the camera.
It’s not possible to make out all the words that he’s saying, due to the buffeting of the wind around him.
However, he does seem to say: “We have been attacked and we had no time to do anything.” There are also various expletives, as might be expected.
Not revealed in the video is how the aircraft came to be shot down. There have been multiple Ukrainian claims by now of Russian Flankers shot down by their air defenses. A proportion of these Flankers have also been confirmed as lost in combat, thanks to available imagery evidence. At the same time, there have also been reported incidents of friendly fire that have led to losses of Russian tactical aircraft. So, friendly fire is certainly a possibility that can’t be ruled out on this occasion.
The relatively relaxed manner of the pilot — and especially the fact that he even decided to record the incident post-ejection — suggests that it may well have taken place over Russian territory, or perhaps a part of Ukraine where he could be confident that he wouldn’t be captured by Ukrainian forces.
Ukraine has dramatically demonstrated its ability to shoot down Russian aircraft flying within Russian airspace, so that’s certainly a possibility here, too, although we could also be seeing a friendly fire incident outside of Ukraine’s borders. The U.S.-made Patriot surface-to-air missile, above all, has been extracting a toll on Russian aircraft operating at some distance from the front lines, in Russian airspace.
According to the Oryx open-source tracking group, at least seven examples of the Su-35S alone have been destroyed in aerial combat in the Ukrainian war since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The most recent of these was back in February of this year.
While it’s possible that the incident seen in the video is recent, there’s also every likelihood that it could date from earlier in the war and it might even show one of the Flanker losses that had already been confirmed. At this point, we don’t know for sure.
One online account has geolocated the location to an area near Chervonyi Yar, in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, close to the Russian border, and suggests the incident took place on December 22, 2023. On that day, it was reported that Ukraine shot down three Russian Su-34s in southern Ukraine, although it’s possible that this may simply be another incident, or even that a Su-35S was misidentified as a Fullback.
Beyond doubt is the extraordinary nature of the video, although it’s hardly the first example from Ukraine of how cockpit cameras have changed the way that we see the realities of modern air combat.
There are some parallels between the Russian pilot’s video and that taken by Ukrainian pilot Vadym Voroshylov, callsign “Karaya,” who is claimed to have shot down five Russian ‘kamikaze drones’ in October 2022 before his MiG-29 collided with pieces of missile and drone. He was forced to eject, in an incident we covered at the time. A photo of Karaya’s bloodied face, after ejection, became an iconic image of the air war, while Voroshylov was awarded the Hero of Ukraine for his actions.
Meanwhile, another Russian pilot also recorded his escape from a stricken Su-25 Frogfoot attack aircraft, in headcam video footage that also emerged in October 2022 but which is thought to show an incident from the previous summer. You can read our full assessment of it here.
On that occasion, the Su-25 was flying at very low level when perhaps it was struck by a surface-to-air missile, although it may also have hit power lines. More or less the full chain of events is recorded, starting with the jet departing from controlled flight and then the ejection sequence, followed by the demise of the jet in a fireball, as the pilot floats down to the ground.
Gradually, a growing collection of spectacular cockpit footage is coming together, again reflecting the degree to which almost all aspects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are being publicized via social media like no conflict before it.
The Flanker pilot’s ejection video is especially interesting since, while we may well never know the full story behind it, it’s a reminder that aerial engagements can and are still taking place over both Ukraine and Russia.
With the arrival of the first NATO-supplied F-16 fighters in Ukraine in the last few days, we may well be on the brink of a new phase of the air war, although we are unlikely to see these prized assets being used anywhere near where they would encounter another fighter, for now at least.
Regardless of exactly when and where this Flanker combat ejection took place, it’s very clear that the battle for air superiority in the Ukraine war is far from over.
Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com