Primorsko-Akhtarsk is an air base of the

Russian Aerospace Forces The Russian Aerospace Forces or Russian Air and Space Forces (VKS) comprise the air force, aerial, space force, space warfare, and Missile defense, missile defence Military branch, branches of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. It was ...

as part of the

4th Air and Air Defence Forces Army The 4th Guards Air and Air Defence Forces Army () is an Air army (Soviet Union), air army of the Russian Aerospace Forces, part of the Southern Military District and headquartered in Rostov-on-Don. The 4th Air Army (''4 Vozdushnaya Armiya'') was ...

Southern Military District The Order of the Red Banner Southern Military District () is a military district of Russia. It is one of the five military districts of the Russian Armed Forces, with its jurisdiction primarily within the North Caucasus region of the country ...

. The base was first used in 1954 by a regiment (1689th) of the Yeysk aviation school. Today it is home to the 960th Assault Aviation Regiment (960th ShAP) which has two squadrons of

Sukhoi Su-25 The Sukhoi Su-25 ''Grach'' ( ('' rook''); NATO reporting name: Frogfoot) is a subsonic, single-seat, twin-engine jet aircraft developed in the Soviet Union by Sukhoi. It was designed to provide close air support for Soviet Ground Forces. Th ...

SM/SM3 (NATO: Frogfoot-A) The 559th Bomber Aviation Regiment deployed here from

Morozovsk air base Morozovsk is an air base of the Russian Aerospace Forces as part of the 4th Air and Air Defence Forces Army, Southern Military District. The base is home to the which had three squadrons of Sukhoi Su-34 (NATO: Fullback) as part of the 1st Guards ...

with their

Sukhoi Su-34 The Sukhoi Su-34 (; NATO reporting name: Fullback) is a Soviet-origin Russian twin-engine, twin-seat, all-weather supersonic medium-range fighter-bomber/ strike aircraft. It first flew in 1990, intended for the Soviet Air Forces, and it enter ...

s as part of the 2022

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

Russian invasion of Ukraine

On 2 July 2023 Russian Telegram channels claimed that Russian air defences had "downed a missile" leaving a 10m deep, 4m wide crater some 200 metres from the runway. The airbase is used, according to Ukraine, to launch

Shahed-136 The HESA Shahed 136 (, ), also known by its Russian designation Geran-2 (, ), is an Iranian-designed loitering munition, also referred to as a kamikaze drone or suicide drone, in the form of an autonomous pusher-propelled drone. It is design ...

type drones and

Kalibr The Novator Kalibr (Калибр, caliber), also referred to as 3M54-1 Kalibr, 3M14 Biryuza (Бирюза, turquoise), (NATO reporting name SS-N-27 Sizzler and SS-N-30A) is a family of Russian cruise missiles developed by NPO Novator (OKB-8). It ...

missiles.

Planet Labs Planet Labs PBC (formerly Planet Labs, Inc. and Cosmogia, Inc.) is a publicly traded American Earth imaging company based in San Francisco, California. Their goal is to image the entirety of the Earth daily to monitor changes and pinpoint tren ...

satellite imagery from 28 December 2023 of the air base showed

decoy A decoy (derived from the Dutch ''de'' ''kooi'', literally "the cage" or possibly ''eenden kooi'', " duck cage") is usually a person, device, or event which resembles what an individual or a group might be looking for, but it is only meant to ...

fighter jets painted on the

hardstand A hardstand (also hard standing and hardstanding in British English) is a paved or hard-surfaced area on which vehicles, such as cars or aircraft, may be parked. The term may also be used informally to refer to an area of compacted hard surface su ...

in an apparent deception tactic against Ukrainian attacks. Similar painted decoys have been seen at Kirovske and Yeysk air base.

References

{{Reflist Russian Air Force bases Buildings and structures in Krasnodar Krai Military installations established in the 1950s

Russian invasion of Ukraine

See also

References