As the IL-76 proceeded inbound to the DZ, the two pilots and the radar navigator in the cockpit were carefully watching their radar screens. They were the eighth aircraft in a ten-ship formation that stretched out in a long trail at twenty-two thousand feet. Each transport was stacked two hundred feet above their leader in an effort to ensure that they wouldn’t hit any of the preceding paratroopers who had jumped seconds earlier.
This jump was going to be a HALO, or High Altitude, Low Opening. The paratroopers would cast themselves from the aircraft and free fall to 2,000 feet before they would pull on the D-ring that hung at their chest to open their parachutes. This would allow the transports to stay above and out of the range of most of the anti-aircraft fire, while at the same time, allowing the paratroopers to descend very quickly into the DZ. Another reason that the paratroopers would wait until they were very low before popping their chutes was the fact that if they opened their parachutes from a high altitude, the winds aloft would carry them for miles, spreading men and equipment all over the city of Sevastopol.
HALOs had many tactical advantages, but they were not perfect. Perhaps the worst thing about them was that they left the formation of lumbering transports exposed to any surface-to-air missiles or fighter aircraft that might be protecting the target.
But that wasn’t supposed to be a problem tonight. Russian military intelligence had reported that the Ukrainians had moved almost all of their fighters and most of their army forward to guard the Ukrainian border. The Ukrainians apparently never suspected that the Russians would make a move for the Black Sea fleet or Sevastopol on the first night of the conflict. Russian intelligence had gone to great lengths to assure the Black Hog commanders, as well as the IL-76 aircrews, that the Ukrainians would be wholly unprepared to defend the target.
When the Ural Moon was three minutes from the DZ, the jumpmaster illuminated a red light. Immediately, the men stood up and donned their combat packs. Ahead of them, another formation of transports began to drop their load of light tanks, armored personnel carriers, and small trucks. The men of Ural Moon wouldn’t jump until all of that heavy battle equipment was safely below them.
Everything was quiet aboard the Ural Moon. They were only two minutes out from the DZ. The pilots concentrated on maintaining their position in the formation. The jumpmaster readied his men.
Suddenly, tiny yellow lights began to flicker all over the radarscope. High-pitched warbles screamed in the pilots’ ears to warn them of multiple missile launches. Huge plumes of smoke and fire emanated from the SA-6, SA-2, and SA-10 missile sites as they came to life. The pilots watched in terror as the missiles arched upward at nearly four times the speed of sound.
Something wasn’t right. There were far too many missiles. How could their intelligence have so badly underestimated the number of missiles that were protecting Sevastopol? As the pilots watched the spectacular display, they both swore under their breath and vowed revenge upon their intelligence officers.
The navigator didn’t have a window, but he watched his combat radar screen as a small dot, very bright and incredibly fast, homed in on the lead aircraft in their formation. The two lights merged and blipped and then disappeared from the screen. For just a second, the navigator wondered what it would feel like to suddenly be falling from the sky. He thought of his good friend, Oleh Demyanov, who was in the lead aircraft that had just been blown to pieces, and in his heart he said a quick good-bye.
Missiles and aircraft were beginning to scatter all around him. Some of the aircraft in the formation were starting to turn away from the target, but the crew inside the Ural Moon were determined to hold their position. They were now only ninety seconds out from the DZ.
Ninety seconds to hold their position. Ninety seconds to maintain a constant heading and altitude, despite the fact that white trails of explosive missiles were tracking in on their targets. Ninety seconds of terror and fire, screaming radios and exploding aircraft, white missiles and falling debris.
The pilots in Ural Moon saw another missile as it impacted the fourth aircraft in the formation. The explosion illuminated their faces with its brazen white light. In the flash, the pilots could clearly see bodies falling through the sky. They watched the stricken IL-76 pull violently upward as it spun and twirled out of control. As the aircraft climbed and turned, it nicked the wing of the transport that was flying directly behind it, sending them both into a fiery dive.
Another missile exploded right next to the third aircraft. And that was it. The integrity of the formation was completely destroyed. Like a huge flock of lumbering vultures, the IL-76s began to scatter in every direction.
The result was chaos. Two IL-76s below the Ural Moon collided as they both turned and dove for the ground. Others began to spit their paratroopers out so early that they had no chance of landing in the DZ. Instead the soldiers would find themselves on the ground, outside of the perimeter of their friendly forces.
The Ural Moon was the only aircraft within the formation that continued to fly in position. It was now only thirty seconds from the DZ. In the back of the aircraft, the jumpmaster was getting ready to open the two huge clamshell doors that would allow the soldiers to jump out in rows of four. The paratroopers were all standing, holding to the sides of the aircraft, ready to jump in a gaggle of flailing arms and blowing air.
Then the pilots saw another missile approach. They watched in terror as it homed in on their aircraft, already climbing through six thousand feet and accelerating upward at an incredible speed. The pilot at the controls reacted instinctively as he threw the aircraft into a sharp, turning dive. He turned the transport toward the oncoming missile, trying to give it the smallest possible radar return to home in on. He pulled his four engines back to idle as his aircraft built up speed in the dive. The nose of the IL-76 was pointed directly at the missile, which was now closing at over 2,000 feet per second. To the pilot, it looked like a flaming telephone pole. Just as the missile was about to impact the transport, the pilot pushed over once again and then pulled back hard on the yoke. The aircraft’s nose tracked violently down and then up, forcing the aircraft to porpoise through the cold air.
But it worked. The missile sped on by them, arching upward into the night sky before its rocket engine depleted its fuel. The warhead exploded harmlessly in the air, six thousand feet above its intended target.
The pilot let out his breath, and relaxed his death grip on the control stick. They had defeated the missile. He could hardly believe it was true.
They were now only fifteen seconds out from the DZ. Although they were much lower than they were supposed to be, they were still in a position to drop. In his headset, the pilot heard the jumpmaster counting down to his paratroopers. In seconds they would be falling from the sky.
Suddenly, there was a shattering explosion as the air boiled around them, then the noise of metal wrenching apart. A tearing sound filled the air and penetrated the cockpit, emitted from the bowels of the aircraft with a long and terrible groan. The pilot instinctively screamed. He knew he was dead. Another surface-to-air missile, this one unseen, had exploded just thirty feet from the left wing. The Ural Moon immediately rolled onto her back, a result of the enormous aerodynamic forces that were exerted upon her as her left wing shattered and then abruptly separated from the fuselage. For just a fraction of a second, the aircraft flew backward and upside down before it began to roll and spin violently toward the earth.
Inside the troop compartment, most of the seventy-five soldiers were thrown against the walls and ceiling of the aircraft by the centrifugal force. Their knees buckled and their arms were pinned to their sides. They could hear and feel the structure of the IL-76 bend and twist as the aircraft tumbled through the air. A gaping hole was ripped along the left side of the aircraft where the wing root used to be. A violent wind filled the cabin with a horrible noise. Discipline and order were quickly replaced by a dark despair.