MiG aircraft takes off without escort of radar aircraft in Belarus despite government's claims about its "good condition"
A Russian MiG-31K interceptor jet took to the air in Belarus on Friday without the A-50U airborne early warning and control aircraft (AEWC), even though the authorities claimed that the radar aircraft was "fine".
Source: independent Belarusian military monitoring media outlet Belaruski Hajun
Quote: "The MiG-31K of the Russian Aerospace Forces took to the air from the Machulishchy airbase at 09:00 and landed at 11:01. It was followed by an escort fighter from the Baranavichy air base.
Yet since it was not followed by the A-50U AWACS, the likelihood of supersonic aero ballistic missiles Kinzhal being launched from the MiG-31K decreased."
Details: The A-50U aircraft is used for "scanning" the North of Ukraine, which allows Russians to detect the Ukrainian air defence systems and aircrafts in the air for further launch of missiles, bypassing the Ukrainian air defence.
Background:
- On the morning of 26 February, the BYPOL initiative reported explosions at the Machulishchy airbase in Minsk Oblast in Belarus. There was information about a damaged Russian AWACS aircraft.
- Alexander Azarov, Head of the BYPOL initiative, said that Belarusian partisans were behind it. As he stated, the participants of the alleged sabotage in Machulishchy left Belarus and are now safe.
- Later, media sources published satellite images of the aircraft before and after the incident.
- Journalists compared the images and came to the conclusion that there were dark spots on its wings after the incident. At the same time, it was not possible to confirm the damage to the aircraft, because the spots can be just a visual effect caused, for example, by snow cover on the wings.
- On 1 March, Belarusian Defence Ministry published a video of an allegedly unharmed A-50 aircraft at Machulishchy airfield, moving along on the runway at night.
- Partisans, in their turn, published a video shot by the drone which landed on a radar station of this aircraft with no obstacles despite the Belarusian authorities’ claims that the airbase was guarded.
- On 2 March, monitoring groups reported that the Russian A-50 airborne early warning and control aircraft, which was damaged as a result of a drone attack, flew from Belarus to Russia for repairs.
- The administration of Alexander Lukashenko, self-proclaimed President of Belarus, denied this statement.
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