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Russia’s Elite Crimea Air Squadron Has Lost 7 of Its 12 Su-30 Jets
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![Photo of Vlad Litnarovych]( "Photo of Vlad Litnarovych")
Russia’s 43rd Naval Attack Aviation Regiment has lost over half of its Su-30SM fighter jets since the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine, according to Ukrainian defense outlet Militarnyi on August 15.
The latest loss came yesterday, when another multirole Su-30SM went down, further depleting one of the Kremlin’s most important Black Sea air units.
The regiment, military unit No. 59882, has been based at the seized “Saki” airfield in Novofedorivka, Crimea, since Moscow’s 2014 occupation of the peninsula. Alongside the Su-30SM, the unit also operates up to a squadron of Su-24 bombers.
Military Aviation editor-in-chief Denys Tomenchuk told Militarnyi that the regiment fielded a full squadron—12 Su-30SM jets—at the outset of Russia’s 2022 invasion.
The first Su-30SM loss came on March 5, 2022, over the Mykolaiv region. Both pilots ejected and were captured—Maj. Oleksiy Holovensky, then the squadron commander, and Capt. Aleksei Kozlov, the navigator.
The regiment took another major hit on August 9, 2022, when Ukraine’s defense forces struck the Saki air base, destroying three Su-30SMs and damaging another, along with five destroyed and three damaged Su-24s.
On September 11, 2024, Ukrainian special forces shot down another Su-30SM with a man-portable air defense system.
Then, on May 2, 2025, in a historic first, Ukraine’s military intelligence and SBU, using a naval drone armed with an AIM-9 missile, downed a Su-30SM over the Black Sea.
Yesterday’s downing marks the seventh confirmed Su-30SM loss for the regiment.
In addition, two more of its aircraft have been damaged—one during the August 2022 strike and another on July 1, 2025, when a long-range UJ-26 Bober drone hit the Saki base.
Earlier, Russia expanded the operational use of its Su-57 Felon stealth fighter jets in Ukraine, with reports indicating more frequent missions and broader roles for the aircraft.
