During a massive Russian attack on the night of 23 December, Ukrainian air defence forces destroyed 34 of 35 cruise missiles. Tactical aviation pilots, in particular F-16 fighter jets, played a key role in repelling the attack.
This was reported by the head of communications for the Air Force Command, Yuriy Ignat.
In addition to the F-16s, the Russian air attack was repelled today by Mirage-2000s, MiG-29s, Su-27s, interceptor drones, and mobile fire groups.
“The enemy launched such a large number of air attack weapons. The geography of this attack was extensive — all the way to the Lviv region. Odesa region was also affected. Combat operations were conducted in Khmelnytskyi, Ternopil, and Zhytomyr regions,‘ Ignat said.
The Air Force emphasised the shortage of missiles for Ukrainian air defence.
’The vast majority were intercepted by tactical aviation pilots. It was F-16 pilots who joined in repelling this strike of winged missiles today. I want to emphasise that missiles – both air-to-air and those that our air defence systems use – are in short supply for us today,” said the head of the Air Force Command’s communications department.
As a reminder, on 23 December, during a night attack on Ukraine, the Russians used 635 drones and 38 missiles. Energy facilities in the western regions were the most affected.