Eight months after a Russian fighter jet was downed over Syria by Turkish forces alleging the Su-24 had crossed into the country’s air territory on November 24, Russia suffered another major casualty in its ongoing air campaign against the Islamic State when on Friday ISIS militants shot down a military Mi-25 helicopter near Palmyra in Syria, killing two Russian pilots on board, Interfax news agency said, quoting Russia’s defense ministry.
Lieutenant-Colonel Ryafagat Khabibulin and weapons system operator Evgeny Dolgin, died on the spot when their Mi-25, after having fired on a group of advancing Islamic State militants, was hit with a missile in their tail and crashed to the ground. The two men had been attacking a detachment of Islamic State fighters in the Homs region on Friday, when the Syrian Mi-25 helicopter they were in ran out of ammunition, the ministry said, according to Interfax.
“On July 8, Russian military pilot-instructors Evgeny Dolgin and Ryafagat Khabibulin, were conducting a calibration flight on a Syrian Mi-25 (export version of the Mi-24) helicopter loaded with ammunition in the province of Homs,” the official statement from the Ministry of Defense reads. “The crew received a request from the Syrian command group to help defeat the advancing terrorists and fire for effect. The captain of the aircraft, Ryafagat Khabibullin, made the decision to attack.”
“Having spent their ammunition, while turning back to the base, the helicopter was shot down by terrorists from the ground and crashed in an area controlled by the Syrian government. The crew did not survive,” Russia’s defense ministry added, adding that both pilots will posthumously receive state awards for their actions.
Video footage published on Saturday by Islamic State’s affiliated news agency Amaq showed a helicopter being shot and crashing to the ground against cries of “Allah Akbar.”
Russia’s Interfax news agency reported, citing a source in the Russian military, that the helicopter had been downed with the aid of an American TOW antitank missile system. “According to reports, terrorists used the American TOW system to down the helicopter, which, having exhausted its ammunition, was on the course back to the base at an extremely low altitude,” the source is quoted as saying.
According to RT, the puts the number of Russian military casualties in Syria at 10. In June, serviceman Anton Erygin suffered fatal wounds after falling under militant fire while guarding a Russian center for reconciliation convoy in Homs province.
The killed helicopter pilot Ryafagat Khabibulin is a Russian army Veteran, was among Russia’s most decorated and renowned military pilots. He had taken part in multiple operations in the North Caucasus over the last 25 years. Ryafagat Khabibulin (b. 1965) graduated from Air Force school in 1988 and was stationed in Poland with the 55th combat helicopter regiment, where he trained to replace helicopter pilots taking part in the Afghanistan campaign.
In February 1989, all Soviet troops were withdrawn from the country and Khabibulin continued to train with senior officers, as some 85 percent of the pilots in his unit had served missions in Afghanistan. They taught the younger pilots the tactics and tricks of warfare in the mountains.
In autumn 1992, pilots of the 55th squadron flew missions to curb the conflict in the North Caucasus between the Ingush and the Ossetians. The squadron then took part in putting an end to the conflict between Georgia and Abkhazia. In 1993-1994, Ryafagat Khabibulin spent the whole148 days of the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict on missions.
During the 1994 campaign in Chechnya, Khabibulin’s helicopter came under fire from militants. Ninety-seven bullet holes were later found in the aircraft’s fuselage. Everybody onboard was killed except the pilot, who suffered a fragmentation wound to the face and had his right thigh shot through. Close to blacking out, in a cabin full of smoke and spilled fuel, Khabibulin managed to secure the aircraft. He spent the next eight months in hospital.
In his numerous rescue missions, many of them in extreme weather conditions or under fire, Khabibulin saved the lives of at least 40 wounded soldiers. He received numerous commendations for his skill. His last assignment came this spring, when he was deployed to Syria as pilot-instructor.
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