The Rooks Have Arrived
One of the summer days, I managed to visit the airport where the 18th Guards Vitebsk twice based Red Banner Order of Suvorov 2nd degree fighter aviation Normandy-Niemen regiment, or rather the 18th assault air regiment of the 303th Guards Mixed Air Division.
Initially, the regiment was stationed at the Galenka airfield, but was disbanded on November 19, 2009. Own historical The regiment regained its name on December 1, 2013. To date, the regiment is based at the Chernigovka airfield. The armament (the assault aviation regiment) is armed with modernized Su-25SM attack aircraft.
Su-25 (T-8 product, according to NATO codification: Frogfoot) - Soviet / Russian armored subsonic attack aircraft designed to directly support ground forces over the battlefield day and night with direct sight of the target, as well as destroying objects with given coordinates around the clock in any weather conditions. The troops got the nickname "Rook".
Modification of the Su-25SM differs from the Su-25 avionics, the presence of ILS and MFD
The attack aircraft is armed with a built-in gun mount VPU-17A with a double-barreled 30-mm air cannon GSH-30-2
The rest of the armament is placed on the underwing pylons, depending on the task, the attack aircraft can carry both aerial bombs and missiles.
Many attack aircraft from the "first" series of deliveries have a camouflage color and the emblem of the 121 aircraft factory
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Later stormtroopers are already painted in monochrome dark gray
While we were shooting at the airfield, intensive preparations were made for flights.
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According to the plan, the regiment was to be relocated to another site and from there to conduct training bombing with a practical aerial bomb, P-50T
To perform this task, part of the aircraft technicians were transferred to the place of the training exercises by transport aircraft
Following the techniques from the airfield soar attack aircraft
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They take off not only individually, but also in pairs, which indicates a high training of flight personnel
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The regiment flies very intensively, performs various training tasks, takes part in exercises,
crews take part in Aviadarts. In September, the regiment 2014 was commended for deploying the airfield segment of the Ussuri M-60 highway with landing and re-departure.
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Conducting stormtroopers visited TECH
The pilots are superstitious people and therefore they do not like to be photographed very much, so it seems that there is no one in the TEC, but in fact the work on preparing the aircraft is under way.
"anchorage"
Since the Su-25 attack aircraft can use not only prepared airfields, but also normal sites (for example, a road) for landing, the TECs should provide services at such sites. The necessary equipment is located on the base ZIL-131
In summer, weather conditions allow maintenance of equipment in the open air.
and for winter conditions, a thermal shelter is used in a TEC. In such a shelter, you can easily maintain up to 3-x attack aircraft. The shelter is prefabricated (inflatable on the frame), heating is carried out using "heat guns"
"Chernigovka" is one of the airfields where the planes are stored in covered caponiers ....
Training and combat Spark Su-XNUMHUB - covered with sand in anticipation of newcomers.
On the territory of the unit there is a poster with historical milestones in the history of the regiment.
and awards
At the moment, the regiment is actively working to fully restore the historical name and regimental awards, which the regiment lost in a series of reorganizations and transformations.
Thank you for attention.
Information