The Demise Of Russia's Sole Aircraft Carrier Stranded 22 Special MiG Fighters. Now Ukraine Is Blowing Them Up.

Scratch one Mikoyan MiG-29KR in Crimea.

The MiG-29KR right before the drone strike. Prymary capture

The Russian navy’s only aircraft carrier, the decrepit Admiral Kuznetsov, has been in overhaul since 2017. Every serious analyst agrees: the 34-year-old flattop is vanishingly unlikely to ever return to service.

The 58,000-ton Kuznetsov’s anti-climactic demise following a frankly embarrassing front-line career orphans the roughly two dozen Mikoyan MiG-29KR fighters—from the 100th Independent Shipborne Fighter Aviation Regiment—that once flew from her deck.

The twin-engine, supersonic MiG-29KRs have special equipment including folding wings, arrestor hooks and reinforced landing gear—all necessary for shipboard operations.

The Russians found a use for the carrier-less MiG-29KRs—deploying at least a few of them to Crimea for combat air patrols over the Russian-occupied territory, a frequent target of Ukraine’s deep-strike campaign.

Now the Ukrainians are doing to the MiG-29KRs what neglect and the elements did to Kuznetsov. On or just before Thursday, a long-range attack drone flown by the Ukrainian special forces’ Prymary unit—the main unit responsible for raids in Crimea—struck a MiG-29KR at Kacha airfield in Crimea.