A Ukrainian pilot spoke about combat missions and an unusual pre-flight tradition
Dmytro, a Su-27 fighter pilot with the 39th Tactical Aviation Brigade named after Hero of Ukraine Oleksandr Dovgach, talks to his plane before every combat sortie. He has already flown over 250 combat sorties and dropped more than 200 bombs.
Before a combat sortie, Dmytro always runs his hand along the fuselage of his Su-27.
A few seconds before taking his seat in the cockpit, he silently tells the plane: “We’ll make it. Everything will be just fine.”
It’s his little tradition.
“It’s your partner. When you get in, the feeling is completely different. It’s not like getting in a car, starting it up, and driving off. It’s like… in ‘Avatar,’” says Dmytro.
He already has about 250 combat sorties and nearly 200 air-to-ground bombs dropped to his credit. And then there are the aerial targets he’s intercepted.
Dmytro describes one such interception as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened: “It was a ‘Shahed.’ I took off, locked onto it, fired a missile—and destroyed it,” says Dmytro.
But a fighter pilot’s combat work isn’t just about the moment of using weapons.
There were also situations when missiles were already flying toward him.
“When you fly close to the front line, near the enemy’s air defense systems and their fighter jets, they fire at you—so you pull away and maneuver to evade the missile,” explains the pilot.
In those split seconds, Dmytro says, a pilot needs a cool and level head. In the cockpit, you have to know exactly what you’re doing and be confident in every decision.
“The enemy has the upper hand, and the resistance to our air operations is significant. But we’re working, adapting to all these situations, and continuing to destroy the enemy,” Dmytro notes.
Dmytro flew his first combat mission in late spring 2022.
He remembers the morning of February 24 as anything but cinematic. After receiving a call from his mother saying that a war had likely begun, he even tried to go back to sleep—his alarm wasn’t set to go off for another half hour.
A few minutes later, a fellow soldier called: “Dimon, looks like it’s started.”
That’s when Dmytro finally woke up for good, quickly got ready, and headed to his squadron.
Since then, a lot has changed in his work as a pilot. Before, it was a profession he had consciously chosen for the speed, constant development, and that special thrill that only fighter aviation can provide.
Now, every flight also brings the realization that people’s lives may depend on the success of the mission.
And Dmytro emphasizes: the pilot in the cockpit is just the last link in a large team.
Before the Su-27 takes off, dozens of people will have done their part.
The pilot’s story was published on September 21 on the channel of the brigade, which is part of the Air Command “Center.”
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