Ukraine’s Air Force reportedly conducted a daring raid last weekend on Russian-occupied Snake Island. Also known as Serpent Island or Zmiinyi Island, Snake Island is located about 80 miles south of the strategic Ukrainian port of Odessa. The strike was carried out by a pair of Soviet-era Su-27 combat aircraft and filmed using a drone (see video below).
Video of the attack was first released and posted on Saturday evening by the Operational Command South of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. It has trended on social media, netting more than 2.3 million views so far.
“The Ukrainian Air force is still alive — seen here are two Ukrainian Su-27 striking Russian facilities on the famous Snake Island in the Black Sea, in remarkable footage filmed by a TB-2 drone. As we can observe, there is serious damage,” Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) announced in a tweet.
The video shows the Su-27s making a high-speed, low-level bombing run on Russian forces. The Ukrainian aircraft entered very low from the south. That is probably not the direction Russian forces would focus on – they would likelier focus on attacks emanating from the Ukrainian coastline to the north and west. The attack destroyed a Russian helicopter.
Ukrainian forces have waged a relentless defense-suppression campaign over and around Snake Island with the Turkish-built Baykar Bayraktar TB2 drones. This medium-altitude long-endurance unmanned combat aerial vehicle is capable of remotely controlled or autonomous flight. The Ukrainians have used it against Russian ground forces as well as warships. Last week, a TB2 was reportedly used against a Russian vessel near Snake Island.
Ukraine Cuts the Snake
Russians seized the 110-acre Snake Island in late February, during the early stages of Russia’s unprovoked invasion. Ukraine has steadily attacked the island ever since. The satellite-controlled drones have reportedly been used to destroy at least three low-altitude air-defense systems, as well as two Russian patrol boats and a landing craft.
As David Axe reported for Forbes, “Destroying the air-defenses, along with any naval vessels attempting to reinforce the tiny island—with its single pier, helicopter landing pad and dozen or so structures—cleared a path for the twin-engine, supersonic Su-27s to strike on or before Saturday.”
Image: Creative Commons.
The fourth-generation Su-27 has been primarily employed in an air-to-air role in the war in Ukraine. While it lacks many of the sophisticated systems found in U.S. and NATO strike fighter aircraft, it can serve in a secondary ground-attack role. Its longer range and payload certainly made it a more than suitable aircraft for the raid on Snake Island.
Now a Senior Editor for 1945, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer who has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers and websites. He regularly writes about military hardware, and is the author of several books on military headgear including A Gallery of Military Headdress, which is available on Amazon.com. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes.
CK
May 10, 2022 at 9:44 am
I was amazed how low they were flying. Thought you only saw that kind of stuff in Call of Duty.
Alex
May 10, 2022 at 11:02 am
And now, instead of tantrums and fantasies, let’s face it.
Zelensky is a Kremlin agent.
So in just two months:
1. Actively extorted money from the West.
2. Strengthened the ruble.
3. In addition to the Crimea, he gave Donbass to Russia.
4.. Turned off the gas at the whole of Europe, sending it to the Middle Ages.
5. Ruined the pockets of drivers, farmers, entrepreneurs and manufacturers in the EU and the US.
6. Since the beginning of the special operation, almost all major competitors from Russia have left, making room for Russian entrepreneurs.
7. Begging for so many weapons that even Scholz said that the Bundeswehr was running out of weapons “for himself.”
8. He collected all the crap of the Ukrainian Nazi subculture – tattooed Nazis, outcasts, idiots, maniacs, murderers from Europe and other countries in one place, where the Russians kill them in batches and promptly deliver them to Bandera.
9. United the Russian people around their leader. Russia has never known such powerful support for the actions of the President and his cabinet during all the terms of his reign.
10. He sent into emigration the entire corrupt beau monde of the Russian stage and cinema, with pockets full of “wishes” from the grateful Russian people.
Never before has Russia been as good as under Zelensky.
Alex
May 10, 2022 at 12:47 pm
Jim Chambers (Fergie Chambers) – a journalist from NY spoke about how he SAW the attacks of Ukrainian fascists on peaceful Ukrainians. He told how he SAW what horrors the Bandera Nazis were doing to the Ukrainians. He said that food and medicine appeared when the Russian Liberators came.
He told how he SAW Nazi paraphernalia wherever the military of Ukraine abandoned their positions (swastikas, Mein Kampf books, paintings by Hitler, Bandera, etc.).
He SAW how opponents of the regime of the Ukrainian authorities were detained, tortured and killed. He told how the people of Ukraine are waging their struggle for existence and for peace without Bandera Nazis. He spoke about how the Russian liberators help civilians and the Ukrainians ask the Russians not to leave. The Ukrainians are upset that the Russians came late, they should have come earlier.
He said: “Our American weapons have only exacerbated the useless bloodshed in a battle that the Ukrainian fascists can never win. I am ashamed to carry an American passport with me. The world desperately needs a Russian victory: at the end of Ukrainian Nazism and at the end of the American NATO empire. World needs victory for freedom.”
Alex
May 10, 2022 at 6:29 pm
The result of this crazy and stupid operation:
In the course of a pointless attempt to seize the island from a military point of view, the Kyiv regime lost three Su-24 bombers and one Su-27 fighter in the Zmeiny area. 10 helicopters of the Ukrainian Air Force were destroyed. Of these, three Mi-8 helicopters with landing troops on board, one Mi-24 support helicopter were shot down in the air.
Six more Ukrainian Mi-8s and Mi-24s involved in the operation were destroyed on the ground near the settlement of Artsyz, Odessa region.
Also, three armored assault boats of the Armed Forces of Ukraine “Centaur” with amphibious assault on board were destroyed at sea.
Alex
May 11, 2022 at 12:16 pm
A bit of truth.
The head of the UN monitoring mission, Matilda Bogner, said that the organization has reliable information about the torture of Russian soldiers in Ukrainian captivity:
“Ukraine and Russia must promptly and effectively investigate all allegations of torture and ill-treatment of prisoners of war,” she said.
The military-civilian administration of the Kherson region announced their intention to appeal to Putin with a request to include the region into Russia:
“We intend to live as part of the Russian Federation. We fully cooperate and feel as one with the regions of Russia.”
Pfizer, Moderna, Merck, Gilead are testing medicines in Ukraine, bypassing international safety standards, reducing the costs of research programs and gaining significant competitive advantages. Coronavirus vaccine manufacturers have been involved in US military biological activities.
Along with American pharmaceutical companies and Pentagon contractors, Ukrainian state structures are involved in military biological activities, the main tasks of which are to conceal illegal activities, conduct field and clinical trials, and provide the necessary biomaterial.
The American side expanded its research potential both in the field of creating biological weapons and in the field of obtaining information about antibiotic resistance and the presence of antibodies to various diseases in the population of specific regions.
Ukraine has long become a training ground for Western countries to create biological weapons components and test new samples of pharmaceuticals.
The United States, as part of its military biological program in Ukraine, used Mariupol as a regional center for work with the cholera pathogen.
Evidence was obtained of the emergency destruction of documents confirming work with the US military department. A preliminary analysis of the surviving documentation indicates the use of Mariupol as a regional center for the collection and certification of the cholera pathogen.
The selected strains were sent to the public health center in Kyiv, which is entrusted with the functions of further sending biomaterials to the United States.
This activity has been carried out since 2014, which is confirmed by the acts of transfer of strains.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby on Fox News recalled that the United States supplied weapons to Ukraine long before the start of the Russian special operation.
“The Biden administration was supplying weapons long before the invasion. The first billion dollars that the president allocated for Ukraine did indeed include assistance with lethal weapons … The United States, Canada, Britain, other allies actually helped prepare the Ukrainians, ”Kirby quoted the TV channel as saying.
As military experts and analysts had previously assumed, Ukraine would have brought down all its military power on the Donbass in any case, but Russia was the first to come to the aid of Donyuass.
The world is watching. The world sees. Lies are dying.
Illurion
May 11, 2022 at 9:20 pm
Dear Bandera NAZI Alex:
None of your facts are true.
Over 25,000 Russian soldiers and sailors are dead.
Ukraine is getting stronger by the day.
You should be praying for the sailors of the remaining black sea fleet ships that will soon join the Moskvaa on the bottom.