Ukrainian Air Force pilot, 1st class Lt. Col. Maksym Ustymenko, was killed last night while defending against Russia’s massive air attack. He was 32. Maksym destroyed 7 aerial targets before his F-16 was hit. He managed to steer the jet away from residential areas but could not eject. 29.06.2025

by GermanDronePilot

30 comments

  6. Hit by what? A drone? Not the first f16 lost to drones, not a good trade.

  9. I salute him for defending his country and Europe. Heroyam slava!

  11. Hit by what? This is F16 number 4 lost while taking down drones. Really doesn’t seem like the best use of such a valuable resource. Not to mention the loss of a highly trained pilot… idk but the F16 losses are sketchy, wouldn’t be surprised if this is due to negligence of the commanders leading to friendly fire.

  16. Rest in peace. And I hope hell it wasn’t another friendly fire incident.

  17. RIP to a true hero of the skies in a Nation of heroes. Slava Ukraini 🇺🇦👍🇬🇧🙏🙏🙏 Good will some day prevail over Evil Russia despite the tragic costs. My prayers for peace and comfort to his family, friends and brave colleagues. Never in the field of Human conflict has so much been owed by so many (the entire Civilised World) to so Few (the Ukrainian Nation State) 🇺🇦❤️

  19. Rest in peace Maksym, you did good and you saved lives. Thank you for your service

  20. Hard to think a thousand dollar drone can take down million dollar aircraft

  27. Always hate when “managed to steer away from residential areas” is added to these. It’s almost certainly not something the pilot was doing on purpose, especially in this case of a badly damaged jet at low altitude.

    Let the heroism stand on its own.

  29. It’s great that Ukraine has access to aircraft and pilots who are willing to go up every night to halt the Russian drones.

    But it’s seriously becoming an issue with these aircraft “crashing” into the same drones that they are supposed to shoot down. This sounds like some sort of training issue because this same thing has already happened multiple times on the past 12 months. What exactly is hitting them? The f-16 is advanced enough to destroy flying targets from a safe distance, I assume if they’re getting very close to use guns it could make sense but I hate seeing these f-16s going down.

  30. Do we know why he couldnt eject?
    Issues from the f16 design, or just he was hit in the mechanism?

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