The aircraft were caught on the ground at a re-supply point, footage shared by the Defense Ministry shows
Russian forces have destroyed two Ukrainian Mi-8/17 military-transport helicopters as they made a supply stop at a temporary airfield in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), the Defense Ministry in Moscow said on Wednesday, sharing footage of the incident.
The helicopters were reportedly detected near the village of Novopavlovka, some 46km from the front line. Drone footage released by the Russian military shows three M-8/17 helicopters lined up by a dirt road, with a supply truck and another vehicle nearby.
The improvised airfield was targeted by cluster munitions, which disabled two helicopters. The damaged aircraft were subsequently destroyed by direct hits from guided projectiles, the video shows, although the supply truck and one helicopter escaped.
A separate video circulating online suggests that the truck, which was apparently carrying unguided air-launched rockets, only made it as far as a nearby hanger. The building was later hit by a guided aerial bomb, according to the footage.
The Defense Ministry in Moscow identified the destroyed helicopters as Mi-8s, without providing further details. At least one of the aircraft, however, appeared to be a Russian-made Mi-17V-5, a number of which were procured by Washington in the early 2010s for the Afghan military. They ended up being transferred to Ukraine in mid-2022. The surviving helicopter appeared to be an older, Soviet-made Mi-8MT aircraft.
