A Ukrainian soldier shot down a Russian cruise missile with a MANPADS

This was reported by the Air Command "South".

He had been waiting for this day for a year and a half, since the moment he stood up to defend Ukraine from the invaders. Viktor is a rifleman of the mobile fire group of the Kherson anti-aircraft missile brigade. This morning, December 13, 2024, in the Mykolaiv region, during a massive enemy missile attack, he first performed a combat mission from the Stinger portable anti-aircraft missile system, and immediately shot down an enemy cruise missile.

According to the soldier, he always dreamed that the time would come when he would destroy an enemy drone, perhaps more than one. But he never thought about a missile.

I had never worked with such a weapon before, but I wasn't worried at all during the shot. Together with my comrades, we quickly identified the target, where the enemy missile was coming from and where it was flying, and then it was maximum attention, faith in the result, and a matter of technique.

Family and friends are the main motivation for Viktor to hold a weapon in his hands and expel the Russian occupier from Ukrainian soil.

Mobile fire team shoots down Russian cruise missile

The commander of the machine gun section of the security platoon of the Galicia-Volyn Radio Engineering Brigade, Junior Sergeant Volodymyr Pshenychnyak, from the Igla portable anti-aircraft missile system, destroyed a Russian cruise missile.

The downed missile did not cause any damage to critical infrastructure. The crash site and the missile remains were found by a search team.

It is noted that during the Russian attack on December 13, air defense units and the aviation of the "West" air command in their area of responsibility destroyed 52 air- and sea-based cruise missiles Kh-101/Kh-55SM, "Caliber" and 2 Shahed attack drones.