The crash is the primary involving in an F-16 since they started arriving in Ukraine late final month.
Ukraine has introduced that certainly one of a handful of F-16 fighter jets given by its Western allies to battle Russia’s invasion crashed whereas repelling a serious Russian aerial assault.
The pilot was killed within the incident, which passed off on Monday after Russia launched more than 200 missiles and drones in certainly one of its greatest bombardments of the war.
It’s the first reported destruction of an F-16 in Ukraine, and comes simply weeks after Kyiv started taking supply of the planes.
No less than six of the plane are believed to have been delivered.
“F-16 fighters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine had been used to repel a missile assault on the territory of Ukraine by the Russian Federation, together with items of anti-aircraft missile troops,” the Ukrainian military mentioned.
It added that communication with the F-16 was misplaced because the planes approached their subsequent goal.
“Because it turned out later, the plane crashed, killing the pilot,” the navy mentioned.
The assertion didn’t title the pilot, however a unit of Ukraine’s air drive mentioned certainly one of its pilots, Oleksiy Mes, had died in a crash on Monday.
“On 26 August, whereas repelling a Russian large mixed missile and air strike, Oleksiy destroyed three cruise missiles and one assault drone,” Ukraine’s Western air command unit mentioned.
“Oleksiy saved Ukrainians from lethal Russian missiles. Sadly, at the price of his personal life,” it added.
Investigation beneath approach
Mes, recognized by his name signal Moonfish, travelled to the US as a part of Ukraine’s efforts to persuade the USA and different NATO allies to ship F-16s.
Once I met with Ukraine pilots Juice (left) and Moonfish (proper) I had a sick feeling they wouldn’t make it by the conflict. Juice died in Aug 2023, Moonfish died on Monday. They fought like hell for Ukraine, and the F16. Nickel on the grass males. Slava Ukrainii pic.twitter.com/uErBmyQGBa
— Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 (@AdamKinzinger) August 29, 2024
The US approved the plan in 2023 and the primary plane arrived in Kyiv in late July. Belgium, Denmark the Netherlands and Norway have dedicated to offering Ukraine with greater than 60 F-16s. Russia’s jet fleet, nonetheless, is about 10 occasions greater.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence opened an investigation into Monday’s crash.
A US defence official advised the Reuters information company that the crash didn’t look like the results of Russian hearth, and potential causes from pilot error to mechanical failure had been being investigated.
Russia has continued its aerial bombardment of Ukraine since Monday’s attack.
On Thursday, Ukraine’s air drive mentioned air defences stopped two out of 5 Russian missiles and 60 of the 74 Shahed drones that had been fired. It mentioned the 14 different drones are presumed to have fallen earlier than reaching their goal.
Authorities within the capital, Kyiv, mentioned the particles of destroyed drones fell in three districts of the town, however there have been no accidents.
Ukraine says it wants a minimum of 130 F-16s to neutralise Russian air energy.
F-16s can fly as much as twice the velocity of sound and have a most vary of three,200 kilometres (greater than 2,000 miles). They’ll additionally hearth trendy weapons utilized by NATO international locations.