Lipetsk Aviation Center(colloquial name) - a structural formation of the Russian Air Force that carries out retraining of flight and engineering personnel of combat units, as well as the development and implementation of methods for the combat use of aviation complexes.
The head of the Lipetsk Aviation Center is Major General Yuri Aleksandrovich Sushkov.
4 Air Force pulp and paper processing plant and PLS is located at the Lipetsk-2 airfield, 8 kilometers west of the center of Lipetsk, near the urban areas of Venus and Mine No. 10. A large number of decommissioned aircraft intended for disposal are in storage: Su-24, Su-27, Su-34, Su-30, MiG-23, MiG-27, MiG-29, MiG-31
In addition to the existing concrete runway (RWY) 15/33, the airfield has an old concrete runway 10/28 measuring 2,500x40 meters, which is used as parking areas and a taxiway.
Story
The history of the Lipetsk Aviation Center began during the First World War. Back in 1916, the first workshops for assembling French aircraft of the Luran type appeared here. In October 1918, by order of the Main Air Force, a squadron of heavy bombers “Ilya Muromets” began to form in Lipetsk. The squadron was based at the airfield, located at that time on the former outskirts of the city near the railway station (see: Tereshkova Street (Lipetsk)). The Ilya Muromets bombers and the Lebed light airplanes that accompanied them actively participated in hostilities during the Civil War.
The Germans in a very short time reconstructed the production facilities, erected two small hangars, a repair shop, and already on July 15, 1925, a joint flight-tactical school was opened. Initially, the material base was 50 Fokker D-XIII fighters purchased by Vogr with funds from the Ruhr Fund in the Netherlands in 1923-1925. On June 28, 1925, the planes arrived from Stettin to Leningrad on the ship Edmund Hugo Stinnes. Transport aircraft and bombers were also purchased. Flight training took place over 5-6 months. The school was led by Major V. Shtar, and the position of a Soviet deputy, a representative of the Red Army, was also provided.
In the summer, during the flight period, the ground personnel numbered over 200 people (on the German side - about 140 people), in winter the figure decreased (on the German side - about 40 people). In 1932, the total number of personnel of the center reached 303 people: 43 German and 26 Soviet cadets, 234 workers, employees and technical specialists. The leadership of the Reichswehr strictly controlled all the details of the activities of joint structures on the territory of the USSR, and special attention was paid to secrecy. German pilots wore Soviet uniforms without insignia.
Research work was carried out at the school, for which the German General Staff secretly acquired material abroad. The practical training course for pilots included practicing air combat, bombing from various positions, studying weapons and equipment for aircraft - machine guns, cannons, optical instruments (sights for bombing and mirror sights for fighters), etc.
In just eight years of its existence, the aviation school in Lipetsk trained or retrained 120 fighter pilots (30 of them were participants in the First World War, 20 were former civil aviation pilots) for Germany. The exact number of Soviet aviation specialists who underwent training under the guidance of German instructors could not be established.
In the early 1930s, even before Hitler came to power in Germany, German participation in the project began to noticeably decline. Already at the negotiations in November 1931, the German side avoided discussing the possibility of turning the aviation school in Lipetsk into a large joint research center. This happened due to the rapprochement of the USSR with other Western European countries, in particular with France. The Treaty of Rapallo, signed between the RSFSR and the Weimar Republic in 1922, began to lose its relevance. On September 15, 1933, the Lipetsk project was closed, the buildings erected by German specialists, and a significant part of the equipment were transferred to the Soviet side.
Higher Flight Tactical School of the Air Force
4th Air Force Combat Weapons Center was formed in Tambov on April 19, 1953. In 1954 he was transferred to Voronezh, and in 1960 to Lipetsk, after which he was transformed into 4th Center for Combat Use and Retraining of Air Force Flight Personnel.
More than 45 thousand officers of various specialties were trained in the training department of the center during the Soviet period. At the Lipetsk Aviation Center, 11 Soviet pilot-cosmonauts were also retrained for new types of aircraft. As a symbol of the glorious aviation history of Lipetsk, in August 1969, a monument was erected on Aviators Square - a MiG-19 fighter soaring upward.
In 2013, the flight crew of the aviation center began mastering the super-maneuverable multirole fighters Su-30SM; in 2014, development of the Su-35S fighter began.
In 2014, the airfield of the aviation center was used as a base airfield for the duration of the Aviadarts Air Force and Navy aviation flight crew competitions.
In August 2015, the head of the aviation center, Major General Alexander Kharchevsky, resigned; his place was taken by Hero of Russia Major General Sergei Kobylash.
Structure
- 968th Research and Instructor Mixed Aviation Regiment (968 ISAP) - Lipetsk - MiG-29, Su-24, Su-25, Su-27, Su-30, Su-34, Yak-130
- 4020th Aircraft Reserve Base (4020 BRS) - Lipetsk
In 2007, the center received the latest Su-34 fighter-bomber and modernized Su-24M2 front-line bombers. In 2010, the Lipetsk Aviation Center included the 344th Center for Training and Retraining of Army Aviation Flight Personnel in the city of Torzhok, Tver Region.
Aviation Center Museum
The aviation center has its own museum, which has been operating since 1980. The exhibition located there reflects in detail the main stages of the city’s aviation history from the first squadron of Ilya Muromets aircraft to the present day. The museum's exposition includes samples of aviation weapons and equipment, special uniforms, models of airplanes and helicopters, as well as memorable gifts to the aviation center.
School on Ignatiev Street
After the war, the aviation center was given four houses on Ignatiev Street - No. 31, No. 36, No. 38 and No. 40, which previously housed a German school. In 2008, buildings that had protected status were demolished (see: Ignatieva Street (Lipetsk)).
Chiefs
Heads of the 4th Center for Combat Use and Retraining of Air Force Flight Personnel named after. V. P. Chkalova
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Notes
Links
- // Lipetsk newspaper
An excerpt characterizing the Lipetsk Aviation Center
Bennigsen from Gorki descended along the high road to the bridge, which the officer from the mound pointed out to Pierre as the center of the position and on the bank of which lay rows of mown grass that smelled of hay. They drove across the bridge to the village of Borodino, from there they turned left and past a huge number of troops and cannons they drove out to a high mound on which the militia was digging. It was a redoubt that did not yet have a name, but later received the name Raevsky redoubt, or barrow battery.Pierre did not pay much attention to this redoubt. He did not know that this place would be more memorable for him than all the places in the Borodino field. Then they drove through the ravine to Semenovsky, in which the soldiers were taking away the last logs of the huts and barns. Then, downhill and uphill, they drove forward through broken rye, knocked out like hail, along a road newly laid by artillery along the ridges of arable land to the flushes [a type of fortification. (Note by L.N. Tolstoy.) ], also still being dug at that time.
Bennigsen stopped at the flushes and began to look ahead at the Shevardinsky redoubt (which was ours only yesterday), on which several horsemen could be seen. The officers said that Napoleon or Murat was there. And everyone looked greedily at this bunch of horsemen. Pierre also looked there, trying to guess which of these barely visible people was Napoleon. Finally, the riders rode off the mound and disappeared.
Bennigsen turned to the general who approached him and began to explain the entire position of our troops. Pierre listened to Bennigsen's words, straining all his mental strength to understand the essence of the upcoming battle, but he felt with disappointment that his mental abilities were insufficient for this. He didn't understand anything. Bennigsen stopped talking, and noticing the figure of Pierre, who was listening, he suddenly said, turning to him:
– I think you’re not interested?
“Oh, on the contrary, it’s very interesting,” Pierre repeated, not entirely truthfully.
From the flush they drove even further to the left along a road winding through a dense, low birch forest. In the middle of it
forest, a brown hare with white legs jumped out onto the road in front of them and, frightened by the clatter of a large number of horses, he was so confused that he jumped along the road in front of them for a long time, arousing everyone’s attention and laughter, and only when several voices shouted at him, he rushed to the side and disappeared into the thicket. After driving about two miles through the forest, they came to a clearing where the troops of Tuchkov’s corps, which was supposed to protect the left flank, were stationed.
Here, on the extreme left flank, Bennigsen spoke a lot and passionately and made, as it seemed to Pierre, an important military order. There was a hill in front of Tuchkov’s troops. This hill was not occupied by troops. Bennigsen loudly criticized this mistake, saying that it was crazy to leave the height commanding the area unoccupied and place troops under it. Some generals expressed the same opinion. One in particular spoke with military fervor about the fact that they were put here for slaughter. Bennigsen ordered in his name to move the troops to the heights.
This order on the left flank made Pierre even more doubtful of his ability to understand military affairs. Listening to Bennigsen and the generals condemning the position of the troops under the mountain, Pierre fully understood them and shared their opinion; but precisely because of this, he could not understand how the one who placed them here under the mountain could make such an obvious and gross mistake.
Pierre did not know that these troops were not placed to defend the position, as Bennigsen thought, but were placed in a hidden place for an ambush, that is, in order to be unnoticed and suddenly attack the advancing enemy. Bennigsen did not know this and moved the troops forward for special reasons without telling the commander-in-chief about it.
On this clear August evening on the 25th, Prince Andrei lay leaning on his arm in a broken barn in the village of Knyazkova, on the edge of his regiment’s location. Through the hole in the broken wall, he looked at a strip of thirty-year-old birch trees with their lower branches cut off running along the fence, at an arable land with stacks of oats broken on it, and at bushes through which the smoke of fires—soldiers’ kitchens—could be seen.
No matter how cramped and no one needed and no matter how difficult his life now seemed to Prince Andrei, he, just like seven years ago at Austerlitz on the eve of the battle, felt agitated and irritated.
Orders for tomorrow's battle were given and received by him. There was nothing else he could do. But the simplest, clearest thoughts and therefore terrible thoughts did not leave him alone. He knew that tomorrow's battle was going to be the most terrible of all those in which he participated, and the possibility of death for the first time in his life, without any regard to everyday life, without consideration of how it would affect others, but only according to in relation to himself, to his soul, with vividness, almost with certainty, simply and horribly, it presented itself to him. And from the height of this idea, everything that had previously tormented and occupied him was suddenly illuminated by a cold white light, without shadows, without perspective, without distinction of outlines. His whole life seemed to him like a magic lantern, into which he looked for a long time through glass and under artificial lighting. Now he suddenly saw, without glass, in bright daylight, these poorly painted pictures. “Yes, yes, these are the false images that worried and delighted and tormented me,” he said to himself, turning over in his imagination the main pictures of his magic lantern of life, now looking at them in this cold white light of day - a clear thought of death. “Here they are, these crudely painted figures that seemed to be something beautiful and mysterious. Glory, public good, love for a woman, the fatherland itself - how great these pictures seemed to me, what deep meaning they seemed filled with! And all this is so simple, pale and rough in the cold white light of that morning, which I feel is rising for me. Three major sorrows of his life in particular occupied his attention. His love for a woman, the death of his father and the French invasion that captured half of Russia. “Love!.. This girl, who seemed to me full of mysterious powers. How I loved her! I made poetic plans about love, about happiness with it. Oh dear boy! – he said out loud angrily. - Of course! I believed in some kind of ideal love, which was supposed to remain faithful to me during the whole year of my absence! Like the tender dove of a fable, she was to wither away from me. And all this is much simpler... All this is terribly simple, disgusting!
My father also built in Bald Mountains and thought that this was his place, his land, his air, his men; but Napoleon came and, not knowing about his existence, pushed him off the road like a piece of wood, and his Bald Mountains and his whole life fell apart. And Princess Marya says that this is a test sent from above. What is the purpose of the test when it no longer exists and will not exist? will never happen again! He's gone! So who is this test for? Fatherland, death of Moscow! And tomorrow he will kill me - and not even a Frenchman, but one of his own, as yesterday a soldier emptied a gun near my ear, and the French will come, take me by the legs and head and throw me into a hole so that I don’t stink under their noses, and new conditions will arise lives that will also be familiar to others, and I will not know about them, and I will not exist.”
He looked at the strip of birch trees with their motionless yellow, green and white bark, glistening in the sun. “To die, so that they would kill me tomorrow, so that I wouldn’t exist... so that all this would happen, but I wouldn’t exist.” He vividly imagined the absence of himself in this life. And these birches with their light and shadow, and these curly clouds, and this smoke from the fires - everything around was transformed for him and seemed something terrible and threatening. A chill ran down his spine. Quickly getting up, he left the barn and began to walk.
Voices were heard behind the barn.
- Who's there? – Prince Andrei called out.
The red-nosed captain Timokhin, the former company commander of Dolokhov, now, due to the decline of officers, a battalion commander, timidly entered the barn. He was followed by the adjutant and the regimental treasurer.
Prince Andrei hastily stood up, listened to what the officers had to convey to him, gave them some more orders and was about to let them go, when a familiar, whispering voice was heard from behind the barn.
- Que diable! [Damn it!] - said the voice of a man who bumped into something.
Prince Andrei, looking out of the barn, saw Pierre approaching him, who tripped on a lying pole and almost fell. It was generally unpleasant for Prince Andrei to see people from his world, especially Pierre, who reminded him of all those difficult moments that he experienced on his last visit to Moscow.
- That's how! - he said. - What destinies? I didn't wait.
While he was saying this, in his eyes and the expression of his whole face there was more than dryness - there was hostility, which Pierre immediately noticed. He approached the barn in the most animated state of mind, but when he saw the expression on Prince Andrei’s face, he felt constrained and awkward.
“I arrived... so... you know... I arrived... I’m interested,” said Pierre, who had already senselessly repeated this word “interesting” so many times that day. “I wanted to see the battle.”
- Yes, yes, what do the Masonic brothers say about the war? How to prevent it? - said Prince Andrei mockingly. - Well, what about Moscow? What are mine? Have you finally arrived in Moscow? – he asked seriously.
- We've arrived. Julie Drubetskaya told me. I went to see them and didn’t find them. They left for the Moscow region.
The officers wanted to take their leave, but Prince Andrei, as if not wanting to remain face to face with his friend, invited them to sit and drink tea. Benches and tea were served. The officers, not without surprise, looked at the thick, huge figure of Pierre and listened to his stories about Moscow and the disposition of our troops, which he managed to travel around. Prince Andrei was silent, and his face was so unpleasant that Pierre addressed himself more to the good-natured battalion commander Timokhin than to Bolkonsky.
- So, did you understand the entire disposition of the troops? - Prince Andrei interrupted him.
- Yes, that is, how? - said Pierre. “As a non-military person, I can’t say that I completely, but I still understood the general arrangement.”
“Eh bien, vous etes plus avance que qui cela soit, [Well, you know more than anyone else.],” said Prince Andrei.
- A! - Pierre said in bewilderment, looking through his glasses at Prince Andrei. - Well, what do you say about the appointment of Kutuzov? - he said.
“I was very happy about this appointment, that’s all I know,” said Prince Andrei.
- Well, tell me, what is your opinion about Barclay de Tolly? In Moscow, God knows what they said about him. How do you judge him?
“Ask them,” said Prince Andrei, pointing to the officers.
Pierre looked at him with a condescendingly questioning smile, with which everyone involuntarily turned to Timokhin.
“They saw the light, your Excellency, as your Serene Highness did,” Timokhin said, timidly and constantly looking back at his regimental commander.
- Why is this so? asked Pierre.
- Yes, at least about firewood or feed, I’ll report to you. After all, we were retreating from the Sventsyans, don’t you dare touch a twig, or some hay, or anything. After all, we are leaving, he gets it, isn’t it, your Excellency? - he turned to his prince, - don’t you dare. In our regiment, two officers were put on trial for such matters. Well, as His Serene Highness did, it just became so about this. We saw the light...
- So why did he forbid it?
Timokhin looked around in confusion, not understanding how or what to answer such a question. Pierre turned to Prince Andrei with the same question.
“And so as not to ruin the region that we left to the enemy,” said Prince Andrei with malicious mockery. – This is very thorough; The region must not be allowed to be plundered and the troops must not be accustomed to looting. Well, in Smolensk, he also correctly judged that the French could get around us and that they had more forces. But he couldn’t understand that,” Prince Andrei suddenly shouted in a thin voice, as if breaking out, “but he couldn’t understand that we fought there for the first time for Russian land, that there was such a spirit in the troops that I had never seen, that We fought off the French for two days in a row and that this success increased our strength tenfold. He ordered a retreat, and all efforts and losses were in vain. He didn’t think about betrayal, he tried to do everything as best as possible, he thought it over; but that’s why it’s no good. He is no good now precisely because he thinks everything over very thoroughly and carefully, as every German should. How can I tell you... Well, your father has a German footman, and he is an excellent footman and will satisfy all his needs better than you, and let him serve; but if your father is sick at the point of death, you will drive away the footman and with your unusual, clumsy hands you will begin to follow your father and calm him down better than a skilled but stranger. That's what they did with Barclay. While Russia was healthy, a stranger could serve her, and she had an excellent minister, but as soon as she was in danger; I need my own, dear person. And in your club they made up the idea that he was a traitor! The only thing they will do by slandering him as a traitor is that later, ashamed of their false accusation, they will suddenly make a hero or a genius out of the traitors, which will be even more unfair. He is an honest and very neat German...
“However, they say he is a skilled commander,” said Pierre.
“I don’t understand what a skilled commander means,” said Prince Andrey with mockery.
“A skillful commander,” said Pierre, “well, the one who foresaw all the contingencies... well, guessed the thoughts of the enemy.”
“Yes, this is impossible,” said Prince Andrei, as if about a long-decided matter.
Pierre looked at him in surprise.
“However,” he said, “they say that war is like a chess game.”
“Yes,” said Prince Andrei, “only with this small difference that in chess you can think about every step as much as you like, that you are there outside the conditions of time, and with this difference that a knight is always stronger than a pawn and two pawns are always stronger.” one, and in war one battalion is sometimes stronger than a division, and sometimes weaker than a company. The relative strength of the troops cannot be known to anyone. Believe me,” he said, “if anything depended on the orders of the headquarters, I would have been there and made the orders, but instead I have the honor of serving here, in the regiment with these gentlemen, and I think that we really tomorrow will depend, not on them... Success has never depended and will not depend on position, weapons, or even numbers; and least of all from the position.
- And from what?
“From the feeling that is in me, in him,” he pointed to Timokhin, “in every soldier.”
Prince Andrei looked at Timokhin, who looked at his commander in fear and bewilderment. In contrast to his previous restrained silence, Prince Andrei now seemed agitated. He apparently could not resist expressing those thoughts that unexpectedly came to him.
– The battle will be won by the one who is determined to win it. Why did we lose the battle at Austerlitz? Our loss was almost equal to that of the French, but we told ourselves very early that we had lost the battle - and we lost. And we said this because we had no need to fight there: we wanted to leave the battlefield as quickly as possible. “If you lose, then run away!” - we ran. If we hadn’t said this until the evening, God knows what would have happened. And tomorrow we won’t say this. You say: our position, the left flank is weak, the right flank is stretched,” he continued, “all this is nonsense, there is none of this.” What do we have in store for tomorrow? A hundred million of the most varied contingencies that will be decided instantly by the fact that they or ours ran or will run, that they will kill this one, they will kill the other; and what is being done now is all fun. The fact is that those with whom you traveled in position not only do not contribute to the general course of affairs, but interfere with it. They are busy only with their own small interests.
- At such a moment? - Pierre said reproachfully.
“At such a moment,” repeated Prince Andrei, “for them it is only such a moment in which they can dig under the enemy and get an extra cross or ribbon.” For me, for tomorrow this is this: a hundred thousand Russian and a hundred thousand French troops came together to fight, and the fact is that these two hundred thousand are fighting, and whoever fights angrier and feels less sorry for himself will win. And if you want, I’ll tell you that, no matter what it is, no matter what is confused up there, we will win the battle tomorrow. Tomorrow, no matter what, we will win the battle!
“Here, your Excellency, the truth, the true truth,” said Timokhin. - Why feel sorry for yourself now! The soldiers in my battalion, would you believe it, didn’t drink vodka: it’s not such a day, they say. - Everyone was silent.
Our city, founded in 1703, is widely known in Russia not only as a “metallurgical city” and a “resort city”. In the 20th century, Lipetsk also became a “winged” city, an “aviator city”.
The names of such famous pilots as M.V. Vodopyanov, V.P. Chkalov, M.T. Stepanishchev, A.N. Kharchevsky are associated with its name; Aviation formations were formed here during the Great Patriotic War, modern military pilots, including cosmonauts, were and are undergoing training and retraining here.
The first flights in the city began to be carried out already in the first decades of the 20th century, during the First World War, when aviation workshops for assembling French aircraft appeared here. The city's aviation garrison - now the 4th State Order of Lenin Red Banner Center for the training of aviation personnel and military testing of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation named after V. P. Chkalov - is one of the oldest in the country.
The beginning of the aviation history of Lipetsk is considered to be November 4, 1918 - it was on this day that the first combat aircraft of the squadron of Red Army warships “Ilya Muromets” landed at the city’s airfield. In the fall of 2018, the city will celebrate the 100th anniversary of this date.
Until the early 2000s, the history of Lipetsk aviation was not widely covered in the literature. First of all, it was reflected in local encyclopedic publications (“Lipetsk Encyclopedic Dictionary” (Lipetsk, 1994) and “Lipetsk Encyclopedia” (Lipetsk, 1999-2001)). In addition, there were a number of publications about individual pilots, primarily about our famous native, one of the first Heroes of the Soviet Union, M.V. Vodopyanov, as well as about aviation during the Great Patriotic War and the Lipetsk Aviation Center. There weren't many documentary books written on this topic. The last two decades have been marked by the appearance of a number of interesting studies that more deeply reveal the aviation history of the city, which we suggest reading below. All these books are available in the LOUNB collection.
Kovalev S. Yu. Lipetsk aviation
Book “Lipetsk Aviation. 1912-1941" became the event book of 2017. It is devoted to the study of the beginning of the emergence of aviation in Lipetsk and its further development in the period between the First and Second World Wars.
The author of the book is reserve lieutenant colonel, aviation technician Sergei Yuryevich Kovalev. Having become interested in the personality of a native of Lipetsk, combat pilot Nikolai Stavrovich Sakov, who received a pilot's license from the French flying club on September 25, 1911, participated in the fighting of the Balkan War of 1912, the First World War, and the Civil War in Russia, he began searching for information about the aviator in the archives Lipetsk and Tambov regions. Starting from literally the only mention of this surname in the monograph “History of Aeronautics and Aviation in Russia,” Sergei Yuryevich completely recreated the biography of the pilot, the circumstances of life of his family members (N. S. Sakov was married to N. S. Bekhteeva, a representative of the noble Bekhteev family) , and also revealed his role in the creation of the LAM partnership (Lipetsk Aviation Workshops).
As the author himself writes, “the completion of work on the first chapter of the aviation history of Lipetsk, quite naturally, became the beginning of new research.” In addition to the detailed biography of N. S. Sakov, which is the first part of the book, there are six more chapters here, detailing other stages of the development of aviation in the city:
- about the squadron of airships “Ilya Muromets”, which actively participated in hostilities against the White Guard units of generals Mamontov and Shkuro during the Civil War;
- about the Higher School of Krasnoyenletov (2nd VShKVL), the formation of which began in the city in 1923 and the reasons for its closure in 1924;
- about the Lipetsk air group, the Lenin Squadron and other aviation units based in the city in 1924-1929, about their participation in large Soviet air flights, in various military parades, as well as in the Soviet-Chinese military conflict on the Chinese Eastern Railway;
- about the Higher Flight Tactical School (VTLSH) of the Red Army Air Force (1934-1940);
- about the organization in 1934 and activities in the pre-war period of the flying club named after M. V. Vodopyanov and the contribution to the Victory in the Great Patriotic War of its leaders and graduates, two of whom - S. G. Litavrin and S. A. Bakhaev - were awarded title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Each of these chapters contains identified biographical information about teachers, cadets, and command staff of aviation schools.
As a separate chapter, the autobiography of a most interesting person is presented - the famous Soviet pilot, a native of the village of Studenki, Lipetsk district (now part of the city of Lipetsk) Major General Mikhail Vasilyevich Vodopyanov (1899-1980), a participant in the rescue of the Chelyuskin steamship crushed by ice in the Bering Strait in 1934 Seven pilots - participants in the rescue operation - in 1934 became the first to be awarded the title “Hero of the Soviet Union”; M.V. Vodopyanov was awarded the Gold Star medal No. 6 in 1939. Later he fought in the Soviet-Finnish War, in the Great Patriotic War, was a participant in several Arctic and high-latitude expeditions, and wrote books.
The photo appendix contains maps and plans of the described area, photocopies of pages of newspapers and magazines, in particular, the press organ of the 2nd VShKVL - the magazine "Red Eagle", large-circulation newspapers of the 1930s, which were published by the aviation units of Lipetsk - "Aviapost", " Takeoff”, “Air Fighter”, “Red Army Star”, photographs from archives and personal collections of local residents, as well as photographs from 1959 from an album dedicated to the 25th anniversary of the Lipetsk flight courses.
Vodopyanov Heights
A more complete picture of the personality of the legendary pilot Mikhail Vasilyevich Vodopyanov, a man whose biography is a continuous feat, can be obtained from the book “The Heights of Vodopyanov.” It was written by a team of specialists from the State Archive of the Lipetsk Region - V. B. Polyakov, N. P. Seleznev, Yu. I. Churilov, A. T. Bereznev - based on documents that were transferred for storage by the great-granddaughter of the Hero of the Soviet Union - Svetlana Mikhailovna Boldyreva . The authors not only talk about his heroic achievements, but also try to trace the origins of the formation of his personality, to show “how a Hero, a Worker, a Warrior, a Creator, a Writer, a Man, a Polar General was formed from a simple village boy”.
Included here are materials about the state of villages in the Lipetsk district in 1893-1907, about the emergence of the villages of Bolshie Studenki and Malye Studenki, as well as a brief genealogical study of the Vodopyanov family.
The book contains a large number of rare and previously unpublished photographs, as well as a number of poems by ordinary Soviet people dedicated to our famous countryman, which once again remind us of how famous and loved he was in the Soviet Union.
| 39.5g B93 585873-KR 584797-AB 584798-ChZ 584799-AB 585872-AB | Heights of Vodopyanova / A. T. Bereznev [etc.]; under general ed. A. T. Berezneva. - Lipetsk, 2009. - 355 p. |
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S. Yu. Kovalev only mentioned in his research, but did not consider it necessary to present the history of the secret German aviation school, which was actively working in the city in 1925-1933, since by that time it had already been described in detail in the research of the historian Yu. N. Tikhonov. The activities of this school are another page in the history of Lipetsk aviation, which until the early 2000s was very poorly covered in the scientific literature. The LOUNB collection contains three works by Yu. N. Tikhonov that explore this topic.
Tikhonov Yu. N. Secret aviation school of the Reichswehr in the USSR
The first of Yuri Nikolaevich Tikhonov’s books on this topic was published, a small brochure consisting of three parts. The first part is a short essay “The Secret Reichswehr Object in Lipetsk”, which outlines the reasons for the creation of a secret German aviation school for training command personnel of the future German Air Force in Russia and directly in the city of Lipetsk, on the basis of the 4th air squadron of the 38th squadron of the Red Army Air Force.
The second part of the brochure contains a large number of photographs taken by Soviet and German pilots. This is a photo of combat aircraft, buildings of the aviation center and its individual parts, photographs of groups of cadets, as well as the favorite resting places of pilots - Sobornaya Street and its surrounding areas, Lower Park, Petrovsky Spusk, Revolution Square, Upper Pond, Petrovsky Pond, Kamenny Log, Lipovka River , boat stations of the German aviation school on the Voronezh River.
The third part is information about the international conference “Lipetsk School of German Military Pilots”, dedicated to the problem of Soviet-German military cooperation in the 20-30s. XX century, which took place at the Lipetsk State Pedagogical University on September 8-10, 2005.
This brochure can be considered an announcement of the next, larger work by Yuri Tikhonov, published in 2008 in collaboration with Dmitry Sobolev, an aviation historian and figure in the Russian Aviation Society (RUSAVIA).
Sobolev D., Tikhonov Y. Secret flying school
The monograph of these two authors is detailed and multifaceted, using a large number of documents and photographs, the activities of the secret German aviation school in Lipetsk in 1925-1933, the existence of which was secret because it contradicted the terms of the Versailles Peace Treaty.
Over the eight years of its existence, the aviation school in Lipetsk trained and retrained more than 200 German military pilots. In addition, former cadets already became instructors in Germany, and about 230 more pilots were trained under the programs developed in Lipetsk. The quality of their training is based on information in one of the appendices of the book, which contains biographies of senior Luftwaffe officers who studied in Lipetsk. Most of them had very high military ranks (air general, major general, air unit commander, etc.).
Soviet pilots also trained here. It is difficult to determine their exact number, but it is known that by the end of 1929, 140 Soviet pilots and mechanics passed through this aviation school.
The aviation school was not only a place for training personnel for the Reichswehr, but also a place for testing new German combat aircraft. Since 1930, test work in Lipetsk began to predominate, the training group for observer pilots was liquidated, a number of outdated two-seater aircraft were removed, and the flying school itself was reorganized into an experimental testing station - “Vifupal”.
In this major scientific work, the reader can find a lot of new information about the peculiarities of the training of German cadets, about the types of combat aircraft that were tested, about how the relationship developed between the pilots of the two countries and the residents of the city, about the impact of the existence of the German center in our country on the development of the Air Forces of Germany and the USSR, as well as the efforts of the intelligence services, on the one hand, of Russia and Germany to maintain the secret of the existence of the aviation school, and on the other hand, of England, France and Poland to declassify it.
In the appendices there is a list of senior Luftwaffe officers who underwent flight training here, a complete list of German aircraft based at the Lipetsk airfield in different years, as well as information on the condition of the 4th detachment of the 38th separate aviation squadron as of 11/01/1930.
In 1933, for a number of reasons, primarily due to the developing deterioration of both Soviet-German relations and the internal political situation in the USSR, the aviation school was closed, and on August 18 the airfield in Lipetsk was returned to the jurisdiction of the Red Army Air Force.
Tikhonov Yu. Secret city
The two editions of the book “The Secret City,” published in the author’s edition, differ from the book presented above in their broader coverage of the period of the 1920-30s. in the history of the city, as well as in-depth coverage of the training of Soviet flight specialists.
The first stages of the formation of the so-called “small academy” of the Soviet Air Force here - the modern Lipetsk Aviation Center named after V.P. Chkalov - are covered in sufficient detail here - the activities of the 40th (then 38th) squadron and the 10th Separate Aviation Squadron, under which the 10th operated I'm an aviation school, aircraft mechanics school job.
The study significantly expands the description of the “secret war” of the intelligence services around the secret agreement between the Reichswehr and the Red Army, as well as the activities of German intelligence in collecting data on Soviet territory, communications facilities, military equipment, and the opposing work of the structures of the Intelligence Directorate and the OGPU.
Once again, the myths about the activities of the aviation school that have developed over many years have been convincingly dispelled, for example, about the training of Hermann Goering in Lipetsk, about the testing of the Junkers-87 aircraft in Lipetsk, as well as the fact that the city allegedly was not subjected to German bombing during the Great Patriotic War. Patriotic War
Compared to previous studies, the book contains a significantly larger number of technical, historical and contemporary photographs.
| 63.3(2R-4Li)6 T46 595536F-KH(RF) 595537F-OO 595538F–KR | Tikhonov, Yu. Secret city / Yu. N. Tikhonov. - Saratov, 2011. - 239 p. |
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| 63.3(2R-4Li)6 T46 600528F-AB | Tikhonov, Yu. Secret city / Yu. N. Tikhonov. - 2nd ed. - Saratov, 2012. - 240 p. |
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Maslikov V. Wings of Victory
Vladimir Semenovich Maslikov (1946-2014) served in the Armed Forces from private to lieutenant colonel - senior instructor of the political department of the Lipetsk Aviation Center. Since 1993, he worked as the head of the Lipetsk Aviation Center Museum, and also wrote essays on the history of Lipetsk aviation and the activities of the Lipetsk Aviation Center.
The book “Wings of Victory” is dedicated to the 65th anniversary of the legendary 402nd Special Purpose Fighter Aviation Regiment. This regiment was one of the most famous air regiments of the Soviet Air Force. During the Great Patriotic War, among other fighter air regiments, it was considered the first in the number of enemy aircraft destroyed and the second in the number of aircraft shot down in the air.
The air regiment was formed in the first days of the Great Patriotic War at the Chkalovsky airfield near Moscow; it was transferred to Lipetsk for reorganization on June 3, 1943. After reorganization, the pilots of this regiment fought in Southern Ukraine, liberated Kuban, Crimea, Belarus, and bombed Berlin.
In the post-war period, on its basis, the Sevastopol Red Banner Order of Suvorov, III degree, research and instruction mixed aviation regiment was created, which in 1992 became the core of the Lipetsk Aviation Center for conducting flight experiments.
In preparing the book, diaries, letters, memories of veterans, as well as such unique documents as the regiment’s historical form and the combat log were used.
The appendices include lists of flight personnel during the war, a list of Heroes of the Soviet Union, regiment commanders, and a table of their combat missions.
The publication “Wings of Victory” can be considered a logical continuation of S. Yu. Kovalev’s research covering the pre-war period of Lipetsk aviation history, since it tells about events that go beyond the chronological framework of the book “Lipetsk Aviation” that took place during the Great Patriotic War.
Maslikov V. S. Celestials
Another book by Vladimir Semenovich Maslikov, “Celestials,” prepared by him for the 60th anniversary of the Lipetsk Aviation Center, was published after the author’s death, in 2015. It was based on historical essays and articles written by him in different years and previously published mainly in local press.
It consists of two parts. The first part, which makes up about a third of the book, provides an overview of all the main stages in the development of local military and civil aviation - from the first pilots and the Ilya Muromets squadron, with which M.V. Vodopyanov’s military service began, to the secret German aviation school and the Higher Aircraft School. tactical school of the Red Army Air Force.
More information is given about the period of the Great Patriotic War. In addition, information is presented about the flying club named after M.V. Vodopyanov, about the 6th Military Aviation School of Initial Training (VASPO), created on the basis of the Lipetsk and Voronezh flying clubs at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, about the Voronezh Special Air Force School No. 6, which was reevacuated to Lipetsk in 1944 and operated until 1955, as well as about the military-patriotic club “Young Aviator”, since 2009 bearing the name of the head of the Lipetsk aviation center, the first Hero of the Russian Federation S. S. Oskanov, awarded this title posthumously .
Attention is also paid to the development of civil aviation, starting from the formation of the Lipetsk region - from 1954, as well as to the prospects for the development of general aviation (the so-called “small aviation”).
The second part, which makes up two-thirds of the book, is entirely devoted to the history of the Lipetsk Aviation Center. As is known, the activities of the Aviation Center were practically not covered in the media; publications in local newspapers and magazines began only after 1993.
The book “Celestials” describes in detail and clearly, from 1948 to the present, the stages of its organization and development, the main directions of educational, flight-methodological and scientific research activities, educational work from 1948 to the present day. The activities of such structures as the Aviation Center Museum, the Officers' House, the Novik children's and youth sports and technical center, and the house temple in honor of the Prophet Elijah are described. Such a little-known page in the life of the aviation center as the activities of military counterintelligence is covered.
Many facts and photographs presented in the book were previously classified under secrecy and were published for the first time.
State Order of Lenin Red Banner Center for Aviation Personnel Training and Military Testing of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation named after V. P. Chkalov
The history of the formation and activities of the Lipetsk Aviation Center as a special flight-methodological, scientific, research, testing and educational institution of the Air Force of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation is presented in a booklet, also compiled by V. S. Maslikov. The booklet includes a list of the center's awards, a list of its leaders, and brief information about the activities of other similar Russian centers for combat use and retraining of flight personnel. The international relations of the aviation center and the activities of the aerobatic team “Falcons of Russia” are also covered.
Lipetsk wings
Two more interesting collections, published to coincide with aviation anniversaries, were compiled by an interesting person, a true patriot, Vladimir Aleksandrovich Merkuriev.
This is a historian, local historian, who has studied many pages of the history of our aviation. Unlike the authors of previous publications, he is not directly related to aviation; his profession is a physics teacher. Vladimir Alexandrovich is a native of the Smolensk region, born a month before the start of the Great Patriotic War. He has lived in our city since 1955, and has done a lot to recreate pages of the military history of Lipetsk.
In 1967, at school (now gymnasium) No. 19, where he worked at that time, he created a patriotic association that educates schoolchildren in the heroic traditions of the history of Soviet aviation - the expeditionary club “Air Seekers”. He led his students on two thousand-kilometer bicycle tours and two winter ski trips of 200 km to the places of military glory of our pilots.
The club's students took the initiative to perpetuate the memory of the only pilot who died over the Lipetsk land - Hero of the Soviet Union D.I. Barashev - in the form of a bust, the funds for the creation and perpetuation of which they earned independently. Another proposal of theirs - to install a monument to aviation glory - was supported by the commander of the USSR Air Force K.A. Vershinin, who handed over the MiG-19 aircraft to Lipetsk, which was installed on a pedestal on the square of the 50th anniversary of the Komsomol (now Aviator Square).
Materials collected as a result of the search work of members of the “Air Seekers” club and clubs of other schools where museums of military glory of pilots operate (schools No. 2, 5, 9), as well as during meetings with veterans of the Great Patriotic War and the Lipetsk Aviation Center, formed the basis the basis of the collection “Lipetsk Wings”.
The collection was published to mark the 90th anniversary of aviation in the Lipetsk region - the anniversary of the arrival of the Ilya Muromets air squadron in the city. The history of Lipetsk aviation is organically inscribed here in the history of the development of Russian and Soviet aviation.
The period of aviation development in Lipetsk until the 1940s. covered here briefly and in a small number of chapters. The period of the Great Patriotic War is described in much more detail; it tells about a very large number of pilots, including those awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, about the 402nd Air Regiment and other aviation units in which they fought.
The book ends with essays about the organization of the Lipetsk Aviation Center, about the cosmonaut pilots who trained here, about the Shelyganov dynasty of pilots, about its leader (at that time) Major General A. N. Kharchevsky.
Lipetsk Falcons
The collection “Lipetsk Falcons” was published five years later and was dedicated to the next 
anniversary of aviation - the 100th anniversary of the Russian Air Force.
All the facts of aviation history presented in the previous collection are reflected in it and supplemented with new details identified during the search work.
Before us are the stories of the exploits of the Heroes of the Soviet Union and Heroes of Russia - M. T. Stepanishchev - our only fellow countryman who was awarded this title twice for his flying exploits during the Great Patriotic War, I. V. Sviridov, who died in the skies over the Chechen Republic in 1996 ., Major General S.S. Oskanov, who did not return from the flight, diverting the failed plane from the village of Khvorostyanka, Dobrinsky district. We learn about the heroism of L. A. Krivenkov and S. M. Sherstobitov, V. I. Novoselov and E. I. Zakharov, A. P. Petrov, O. V. Storozhuk and V. I. Bogodukhov. It also talks about S. E. Treshchev, a native of the Stanovlyansky district, an astronaut who worked on the International Space Station for six months.
Many pages are devoted in the collection to the history of the Lipetsk Young Pilots Club named after S. S. Oskanov, the expeditionary club “Air Seekers”, the Museum of Aviation and Cosmonautics of School No. 51 “Wings of Russia”.
Lipetsk airport. Air gates of the Lipetsk region
A story about the history of Lipetsk aviation would be incomplete without pages dedicated to the history of civil aviation. Already in 1954, almost simultaneously with the formation of the Lipetsk region, the issue of air service to its regions was resolved - passenger and cargo flights were carried out, the Lipetsk air squadron was created, then the Lipetsk united air squadron. Helicopter service developed, as well as agricultural aviation. The Lipetsk airport appeared, and in 2005 it received international status.
Today, Lipetsk Airport is a large enterprise in the air transport industry, consisting of various services, the work of which is covered in two editions of the book about the “air gates” of the region.
All publications described in the review are of interest not only to those who are interested in the history of aviation, but also to everyone who is interested in the history of our country and our city. Unfortunately, almost all of these books were published in rather modest editions (for example, the circulation of S. Yu. Kovalev’s book “Lipetsk Aviation” is only 100 copies), but thanks to the kindness of their authors, you can familiarize yourself with them by visiting the Lipetsk Regional Universal Scientific Library.
We hope that books written by flight specialists who are in love with the sky and their work will attract the attention of a wide readership.
The task of which is to retrain flight and technical personnel, introduce advanced techniques and developments of aerobatic systems into combat units.
At the origins of the Luftwaffe
It was a mystery that the German training and testing association was located in Lipetsk from 1925 to 1933 through the mediation of the Red Army Air Force. Here, research was carried out on the material part, and flight equipment was checked. The pilots of the Lipetsk aviation center received intensive training. The work was classified, the school cadets dressed in the uniform of ordinary Red Army soldiers. The material was purchased abroad and delivered via secret routes to the school. This was the responsibility of the German General Staff. The existence of the center contradicted the Versailles agreements.
Personnel were being prepared for the future Luftwaffe of the Third Reich. Air combat techniques and new bombing techniques were practiced, and the latest types of weapons, optics and instruments were tested. 120 fighter pilots were trained. The less information about the school, the more legends arose around it. Two turned out to be viable. This is because the city was not bombed during the war. The second says that the founder and commander of the German air fleet studied here. Nothing has been confirmed.
Creation of a research association
The center has been formed since 1949. Initially it was a training unit for fighter pilots. Then there were mergers with other courses, consolidation of the structure, change of locations, until they finally settled in the city of Lipetsk.
Aviator training and testing continued in the interests of the Russian Defense Ministry. This research military unit carried out:
- improving methods of combat use of aviation;
- pilots' understanding of new technology;
- introduction of advanced teaching methods;
- mastering weapons of destruction.
Achievements
Dozens of types of aircraft have been mastered. 50 thousand aviation officers were trained and trained, USSR cosmonauts trained here, 50 applicants defended their academic degrees. 50 research and flight technical tests were carried out, a complex experimental and survey program was completed.
The center conscientiously carried out assigned tasks in the interests of the Air Force and the Ministry of Defense. In a short time, the complexes of the latest generations of fighters were mastered and documentation was developed for the operation of this equipment in combat conditions. In 1992, pilots of the scientific unit flew the Su-27 to the USA for the first time, and three years later they emerged victorious in experimental exhibition air battles with foreign colleagues. Indispensable participants in aerospace shows, where they demonstrated the maneuverability of our aircraft in group air combat.
The Lipetsk Aviation Center is constantly present at exhibitions of weapons and military equipment, and participates in international and Russian exercises.
Descendants will remember
The flying specialty places strict demands on the professionalism and moral qualities of the pilot. This has been repeatedly confirmed by the heroic deeds of air fighters who gave their lives to save people in the line of duty.
The land around Lipetsk is abundantly watered with the blood of pilots. Come to think of it, fifty pilots died. This is the price of the security of our Motherland!
One day a tragedy happened. During the flight, the crew of S. Sherstobitov and L. Krivenkov suddenly caught fire, first one, then the other engine. After extinguishing the fire, it was necessary to land immediately. This happened over the city. At the cost of their lives, the pilots managed to take the car towards the outskirts of the village, the crew died. The plane was fully refueled and loaded with bombs. You can imagine the consequences of the fall.
Heroes of Russia Lipetsk Aviation Center
Six people received the title: four are alive and working, and two died.
Head of the Lipetsk Aviation Center, Major General S.S. Oskanov became the first. He was an experienced ace, a professional. During a test flight in February 1992, a equipment failure occurred and the vehicle began to fall on a settlement. At the cost of his life, the fighter was pulled aside, no people were injured. For this feat, Oskanov was presented with the highest honor.
The latest list was supplemented by a lieutenant colonel who was treacherously shot down in Syria. The pilot died, becoming the sixth.
Weekdays
Today the Lipetsk Aviation Center is a research base for MiG and Su combat systems. And aerobatic teams are a clear confirmation of the capabilities of the Russian Air Force. The Center's efforts are aimed at improving the quality of combat training and increasing flight hours. The created series of simulators is an exact copy of components and mechanisms. However, the functionality of training equipment is limited.
On some, piloting elements are polished, on others, the technique of using technology is consolidated, on others - lessons on fixing the skills acquired while studying the controls. A multidisciplinary procedural simulator for the crew of the MiG-29 UB aviation complex (combat training) has been created. It includes the tasks and functions that air professionals perform during flight: reconnaissance, use of weapons in conditions of electronic countermeasures.
In the fight against terrorism
The Lipetsk Aviation Center provides practical experience to pilots on MiG and Su models.
During the operation in Syria, Russian aircraft carried out hundreds of missile and bomb strikes. The precision of the hits is noted to be exquisite, which was ensured, among other things, with the help of the latest Russian analytical complex Il-20. The aircraft is equipped with unique detection equipment and optical sensors. This is necessary support for the crews piloting the Su. The flying laboratory is called the Russian manned reconnaissance aircraft.
Aircraft strike targets with phenomenal accuracy, excluding hits on other objects. In Syria, terrorists are bombed with Su strike systems of modifications 24, 25, 30 SM, 34.
Today the commander of the Lipetsk Aviation Center is military pilot General Mr. Yuri Aleksandrovich Sushkov.
In photographs and videos, filters are lowered on the helmets of air fighters. Faces cannot be shown due to security requirements. This is practiced in world aviation. It is not a fact that pilots studying at the Lipetsk Research Center will fight. But those aces who fly planes to targets in Syria studied here.
Something I see in Lipetsk is that the people are completely inactive, but they have an awesome object, which, to be honest, I didn’t infiltrate myself, but ended up quite officially.. But who needs to draw their own conclusions
The history and present of the Center are formulated in the motto: “Teach airplanes to fight, teach pilots to win!”
The earliest document found on aviation related to the Lipetsk region dates back to June 27, 1908. On this day, a collection of donations was organized in Lipetsk for the Imperial All-Russian Aero Club for the purchase and construction of balloons, controllable airships, airplanes and other aircraft. The history of military aviation in Lipetsk truly began on November 4, 1918. On this day, the first combat aircraft from the Ilya Muromets airship squadron landed at the city hippodrome. The birth of the Lipetsk air garrison is associated with the 2nd Higher School of Red Military Aircraft, which was transferred from Moscow at the end of February 1923. Due to a significant increase in the number of military personnel, and the school staff consisted of 792 people, in May, by order of the commander of the Moscow Military District, the creation of the Lipetsk garrison was announced. 
The most mysterious page in the city’s aviation history for many years remained the stay of the German aviation school there from 1925 to 1933, which was later reorganized into the Vifupal flight test station. Mediation between the German side and the management of the Red Army Air Force was carried out by the apparatus of a special representative office, designed as the headquarters of the 4th non-separate air detachment, called “unit A5” in secret documents.
In Lipetsk, the Germans tested about three dozen different types of aircraft, including seaplanes on the Voronezh River, as well as new types of aviation equipment and weapons. At the same time, training of flight personnel was carried out.
There are many legends associated with this school, the most common of which are two. The first is that during the war the city was not subjected to enemy bombing, and the second is about the training here of Hermann Goering, the future commander of the fascist Luftwaffe. But none of them was confirmed by a careful study of historical documents either in Russia or in Germany. 
During the Great Patriotic War, the Lipetsk region became the base for various aviation units and formations. Aircraft taking off from the main and field airfields near the settlements of Volovo, Voronets, Gryazi, Dankov, Dobrinka, Yelets, Lebedyan, Lipetsk, Ratchino, Talitsky Chamlyk, Usman, Chernava, dealt crushing blows to the enemy. The falcons of the 2nd Air Army, the 3rd Bomber Aviation Corps, and the 9th and 10th Guards Long-Range Aviation Bomber Regiments showed particular valor.
The Air Force Combat Use Center (original name) was formed on April 19, 1953 in Tambov. Since 1954 it was located in Voronezh. In 1960, the formation was relocated to Lipetsk and transformed into the Center for Combat Use and Retraining of Air Force Flight Personnel. In 2010, the name was assigned to the Fourth State Order of Lenin Red Banner Center for the Training of Aviation Personnel and Military Tests of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation named after V.P. Chkalova. In the same year, it included aviation units of long-range, transport and army aviation and unmanned aerial vehicles, and in 2009, the I.P. Kozhedub Aviation Equipment Display Center (Kubinka). 
After a 6-day war, the Egyptians once again asked us for help. In 1970, an air squad of 6 pilots and 4 Mig-25 vehicles was sent south from the Lipetsk Aviation Center to conduct aerial and radar reconnaissance. The Museum of Military Unit 62632 is located at 398000, Lipetsk, military unit 63632 (postal code 398000). You can contact the staff at the following numbers: Guide 34-56-14. Actually, that's where we started. 
Separately, it is worth mentioning the former commander of the center Oskanov Sulambek Susarkulovich. Who is de facto the first Hero of Russia. He has many services to his homeland, and the last of them was preventing the death of people during his test flight. At the cost of his life, he took the plane away from the village of Kozelki, without having time to eject. There is a memorial in his honor at the headquarters. Having learned the historical details of the air school and the center, we went to flights and actual combat use... on simulators. In my simplicity, I assumed that the simulator was an exact copy of all the components. However, in order to optimize the learning process, the functionality of teaching machines is delineated. On some, elements of piloting are performed, on others, they teach the combat use of various equipment, and on others, they simply, if one can put it that way, take lessons on strengthening the skills of using controls, of which there are so many that at first you can break your head. 
Using the STZ-27 simulator, pilots undergo an in-flight refueling course in various weather conditions. It is worth noting that there is no double vision, just a stereo image, and for flights you need to use special glasses. 
The flight path is recorded. Being at the helm of a winged bird for the first time, I felt like a very drunk driver. The best we could do was get into the filling cone, and then under the strict guidance of an instructor. The simulator has a single-seat cabin; in fact, no more is needed; it is made on the basis of the Su-24. 
Then, on the same drying ground, but closer to reality, with a navigator’s seat, we drove through local virtual air spaces. It’s okay to fly, but to land... it didn’t work out; at best, it ended up on the runway. 
In other classrooms, training took place on the crew procedural simulator of the Mig-29SMT multifunctional aircraft complex, which was put into operation in May. The new simulator is designed to train not only refueling, but also the entire range of tasks that an aircraft crew must be able to perform - from takeoff to landing: conducting electronic reconnaissance, using aircraft weapons in conditions of active electronic countermeasures, and so on... 
and then they learned to engage ground and air forces with different types of weapons at a specialized complex produced by Kursk-Simbirsk JSC. The complex is not much, not little, but it’s probably worth the money, you quickly grasp what’s what and hit all the targets on the second go. 
but there were also various troubles
Next, according to the plan of events, we had a very tasty lunch, although we turned away from it as if in alarm and very quickly headed to the Lipetsk-2 airfield, where training flights were already in full swing. So what follows is continuous spotting in chronological order with short explanations.
So, the first thing we saw was a Su-34 coming out of the taxiway onto the runway. number 07 red. 
Aircraft 05 red appeared immediately behind him
New black combat plumage, i.e. coloring, this is how these birds became in 2011. This does not mean that they were simply repainted, this is how they became after modernization in 2010.
The following improvements are currently known:
New types of air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. Upgraded high-temperature turbojet bypass engines AL-31F-M1. The aircraft is equipped with an updated L-150 radiation warning station (SPO). Auxiliary gas turbine power unit TA14-130-35, which will allow launching Su-34 engines on the ground without the use of ground equipment. According to preliminary estimates, such an installation will increase the autonomy of the use of front-line bombers and expand the list of airfields where they are based. As expected, all Su-34s produced since 2011 will be equipped with a TA14-130-35 auxiliary gas turbine power unit. And this also means that they have finally begun to be delivered slowly. As of 2011, a total of 22 combat vehicles were manufactured, including prototypes. The plans for them are truly Napoleonic - their number in the Air Force is planned to be increased to 120. It is planned to receive 12 more aircraft in 2012, and by 2015 to increase the number to 70!. The cost of one machine is 1 billion rubles. 
According to available data, these aircraft (02, 04-09) belong to the 968th IISAP (research and instruction mixed air regiment) based here in Lipetsk-2. (According to other sources, 05 red from the neighboring Voronezh "Baltimore")
The first Su-34s arrived here in August 2007, flying from the Novosibirsk plant under the control of pilots from the Akhtubinsk GLITs (state flight test center) under their own power. In 2008, Su-34 participated in the Victory Parade on May 9 in Moscow, the head of the center A.N. Kharchevsky himself piloted the car. In the same year, this aircraft was put on combat duty for the first time.
As soon as they go into the sky, one of the falcons lands on the ground. Su-30 board. number RF-9222 or 69 Red. The aircraft is externally similar to the Su-27, in fact it is a deep modernization of it. The Russian Air Force has only 9 aircraft of these winged aircraft; by 2020, the number is planned to be increased to 40 SU-30SM aircraft.
Behind him lands another sample of the Sukhoi Su-24 MR design bureau, tail number RF-92250, 52 red. There are 566 vehicles of this type in service. Adopted in 1975, production ceased in 1993. In total, about 1,400 vehicles were produced. Quite difficult to pilot, nevertheless it is the main front-line bomber; it is they that should be replaced by the new 34th dryers.
Meanwhile, the sky is as crowded as before.
One of the Mig-31s is practicing refueling from an Il-78 tanker in real conditions right above us. The aerial refueling system was created on the basis of the Il-76 heavy transport aircraft. Entered service in 1987 and is currently the only specialized type of tanker aircraft. This machine came to work here from Ryazan Dyagilevo, 203rd OGAP SZ (separate guards air tanker regiment).
Almost simultaneously, the 10th red Su-34, according to our escort, piloted by the head of the Lipetsk Aviation Center, Alexander Nikolaevich Kharchevsky, performed aerobatic maneuvers.
I would like to say a little about the Falcons of Russia. The aerobatic team was formed on the initiative of the head of the Lipetsk Aviation Center, Major General Alexander Kharchevsky, in 2001 to improve the tactics of group flights of front-line aircraft and demonstrate the maneuvering capabilities of fighters. Its first composition included: Lieutenant Colonel Vasily Pinchuk, Major Yuri Sushkov, Major Alexander Gostev and Major Yuri Spryadyshev. 
The name of the aerobatic team “Falcons of Russia” was officially announced in June 2004 during an aerial show in Nizhny Novgorod dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the birth of Valery Pavlovich Chkalov. Subsequently, the Lipetsk aces demonstrated their skills in the skies of Norway, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and the Republic of Belarus. In September 2006, the pilots of the group on Su-27 aircraft, together with pilots of the Normandy-Niemen squadron on Mirage-2000 aircraft, flew over Paris in honor of the opening by the Presidents of Russia and France of a monument to the pilots and technicians of the Normandie-Niemen squadron - participants in the Great Patriotic War wars of 1941-1945.
The aerobatic team also has aerial displays in the following cities: Khabarovsk, Yeysk, Tambov, Yekaterinburg, Perm, Severomorsk, Makhachkala, Samara, Volgograd, Voronezh, Yelets, Krasnodar Territory. 
This is the only aerobatic team that uses Su-27 combat aircraft to demonstrate tactical techniques for close-in air combat pair-on-pair at low altitudes and in limited space using defensive-offensive tactics. The complexity and unusualness of this show lies in the fact that the air battle, which takes place in real conditions at high altitudes and distances, is demonstrated for entertainment at altitudes from 200 to 2000 meters directly above the show airfield. In addition to air combat, “Falcons of Russia” demonstrate single aerobatics, as well as in “diamond” and six-aircraft flight formations, a complex of aerobatic maneuvers (Nesterov loop, shell, turn, dissolution, etc.) at minimal intervals and distances 
The pilots took part in the aerial components of the Victory parades over Poklonnaya Gora in 1995 and over Red Square in Moscow in 2008, 2009 and 2010, during which they flew at low altitude as part of a “tactical wing” and accompanied long-range, military transport and special purpose aircraft. aviation.
Demonstration flights are one of the components of the combat training of the Falcons of Russia. The main work is the study of the combat capabilities of aircraft using all types of guided and unguided weapons, which was successfully demonstrated during exercises in Russia and the CIS countries such as “Union Shield - 2006”, “Tsentr-2008” and “Tsentr-2010”, "West - 2009" and "East-2010". In 2011, the pilots included in the group took part in exercises at the Nalchik mountain range, where they successfully completed the task in difficult high-altitude conditions. Since 2003, Sokolov of Russia pilots have been actively mastering new and modernized front-line aircraft Su-30, Su-27SM, Su-27SM3, Su-34, with subsequent training on them for pilots of combat units of the Russian Air Force 
Pilots of the group "Falcons of Russia" as of 01/01/2012:
Major General Alexander Nikolaevich Kharchevsky - head of the aviation center. Honored Military Pilot of Russia, Candidate of Military Sciences. He has the class qualification of “pilot-sniper”. Awarded the orders “For Merit to the Fatherland, fourth degree,” “Red Star,” “For Service to the Motherland, third degree,” “For Military Merit,” personalized weapons and medals, including the French gold medal “For Military Merit” and the badge of an officer of the national order France "For Merit". Born May 9, 1950. In 1972 he graduated from the Kharkov Higher Aviation Pilot School. In 1986 he graduated from the Air Force Academy. Yu.A. Gagarin. During his service, he mastered the L-29, MiG-15, MiG-21, MiG-23, MiG-29, Su-27, Su-30, Su-34 aircraft. He flew on foreign-made combat aircraft F-15 and Mirage-2000. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 3650 hours. Colonel Gostev Alexander Ivanovich – head of the research department. He has the class qualification of “pilot-sniper”.
He was awarded the Order of Courage, the Nesterov Medal, and the Medal of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, second degree.
Born June 13, 1964. In 1985 he graduated from the Kachin Higher Military Aviation School of Pilots. In 2007 he graduated from the Air Force Academy. Yu.A. Gagarin. During his service, he mastered the L-29, MiG-21, MiG-29, Su-27, Su-30 aircraft. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 2250 hours. Lieutenant Colonel Spryadyshev Yuri Ilyich - senior instructor - research pilot. Honored Military Pilot of Russia. He has the class qualification of “pilot-sniper”. Awarded the Nesterov and “For Military Merit” medals
Born August 13, 1962. In 1983 he graduated from the Kachin Higher Military Aviation School of Pilots.
During his service, he mastered the L-29, MiG-21, MiG-23, MiG-29, Su-27, Su-30 aircraft. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 2420 hours. Lieutenant Colonel Andrey Vladimirovich Sorokin – deputy commander of the air group. He is highly qualified as a sniper pilot.
Awarded the Order of Military Merit and the Nesterov Medal.
Born April 23, 1969. In 1990 he graduated from the Kharkov Higher Military Aviation School of Pilots.
During his service, he mastered the L-39, MiG-21, MiG-29, Su-27, Su-30 aircraft. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 1600 hours. Major Musatov Maxim Gennadievich - commander of the aviation unit. He has the class qualification of 1st class pilot.
Awarded the Nesterov medal. Born December 28, 1979. In 2002 he graduated from the Krasnodar Military Aviation Institute.
During his service, he mastered the L-39, MiG-29, Su-27, Su-30 aircraft. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 980 hours. Captain Polovko Denis Nikolaevich - navigator-pilot. He has the class qualification of 1st class pilot.
Born December 7, 1981. In 2004 he graduated from the Krasnodar Military Aviation Institute.
During his service, he mastered the L-39, MiG-29, Su-27 and Su-30 aircraft. The total flight time on these types of aircraft is 780 hours. 
On the ground, pilots are assisted by ground services
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Meanwhile, on the taxiway the traffic does not decrease as soon as the 02 turns red
8th red rushes to take his place in the air 
he is surrounded on all sides by a pair of assorted Su-25 Sturmgewehr rooks 
Su-25SM - Upgraded combat single-seat attack aircraft. Avionics have been updated, HUD and MFD have been added. RF-92255 87 red 
In total, the Russian Air Force fleet consists of 381 aircraft of various modifications. They will remain in service until at least 2020. The first aircraft flew in 1975, accepted in 1981.
They successfully took part in the war in Afghanistan, where they received the nickname “Rook”. One of these aircraft was piloted by the well-known A. Rutskoy. In addition to Afghanistan, they participated in many other military operations. These aircraft are operated in 21 countries around the world, in the Russian Federation they are the main attack aircraft of the Russian Air Force and Navy aviation. 
The Su-25UB, as we see from the combat training index, is a two-seat version of the attack aircraft. RF-92274, 78 red 
In front of the control center stood the most popular helicopter in the world, the Mi-8, board 01 blue. Having plucked up courage and being full of arrogance, we wanted to go for a ride, but as we approached, it turned on the engines, turned its back towards us and took off for takeoff. 
Without getting upset for a long time, we took advantage of the short pause and changed the shooting point. 
RF-92249 47 red was leaving for its departure 
It was followed by the 29th MiG RF-92265 34 red and RF-92262 29 red 
Mig-29 is the most popular fighter, 1600 copies were produced. However, about 300 units are currently in service with the Air Force and Fleet Aviation, and the same number are in reserve. 
While the MiGs were leaving, the An-26 RF-92949 58 red transport aircraft had already landed and taxied 
An hour or two later, having completed his task, he flew on. 
I wanted to return a little more to the Mig-29, I don’t know why this is, but they smoke worse than Kamaz trucks, especially during takeoff and landing. 
and so the whole day passed, take-offs and landings, 
aerobatics
passages 
and refueling 
It’s a special pleasure to see and hear the afterburning of the dryers. The afterburning mode of operation of an air-breathing engine is realized using an additional (afterburning) combustion chamber (hereinafter referred to as FCC). When the afterburner is turned on, additional fuel is burned in the FCS, and the working fluid is intensively heated, which, in turn, leads to an increase in its flow rate from the nozzle and an increase in engine thrust. 
When the engine operates in afterburner, a visible stream of hot gases appears behind the jet nozzle, which has a characteristic striped color. If kerosene is incompletely burned (due to lack of oxygen), the stream will be red in color with yellow vertical rings. If combustion is well optimized, the flame color will be blue. The pressure at the nozzle exit significantly exceeds the ambient pressure, and as you move away from the nozzle, the pressure decreases and the speed of the flowing gases increases. In this case, the cross section of the jet increases and the pressure in the largest section becomes less than atmospheric. After this, the jet begins to narrow again, with increasing pressure. This cyclicity leads to the fact that the supersonic stream of escaping gases periodically (cyclically) becomes subsonic, with the appearance of shock waves - these are precisely the visible light rings of flame. Due to the imperfection of the fuel equipment of some engines, an interesting effect is sometimes observed - on the same aircraft, one engine has a blue exhaust in afterburner, while the second has a red or yellow exhaust.
The temperature of the gases behind the main combustion chamber is limited mainly by the heat resistance and heat resistance of the turbine blades. Installing an additional combustion chamber behind the turbine allows you to circumvent this limitation. The main disadvantage of this solution is a sharp drop in the efficiency of the propulsion system. Due to the above reasons, the switch to afterburner mode of engine operation is carried out only if it is necessary to vigorously accelerate the aircraft (take-off, climb to an advantageous position for attack, emergency exit from combat, overcoming the enemy’s air defense coverage area, etc. 
Several cards from the parking lot. Today, almost a third of the entire Su-34 fleet at the moment has gathered here. 
And also their older brothers and Migi 
The already familiar 69 red Su-30 is once again preparing to take to the skies on this day. 
Its falcon brother Su-27 S, 10 red. 
Su-27S (Flanker-B) is a single-seat fighter-interceptor of the Air Force, the main modification of the aircraft, produced in series. Equipped with AL-31F engines. 
Su-25 RF-92261 86 red 
Su-34 08 red 
But everything is coming to an end and so is our visit. Half-frozen, but happy, we move back, and the crews and their combat vehicles continue to serve. 
In total, the shutter was operated 2096 times during the trip. About 200 cards in varying degrees of processing can be viewed in the album.
Well, as usual, a couple of videos about the Lipetsk Aviation Center and the “Russian Falcons” aerobatic team
And how I was blown away by the wind from the Su-24
The history of the Lipetsk Aviation Center began during the First World War. Back in 1916, the first workshops for assembling French aircraft of the Luran type appeared here. In October 1918, by order of the Main Air Force, a squadron of heavy bombers “Ilya Muromets” began to form in Lipetsk. The squadron was based at the airfield, which was located at that time on the former outskirts of the city near the railway station). The Ilya Muromets bombers and the Lebed light airplanes that accompanied them actively participated in hostilities during the Civil War.
In March 1923, the formation of the Lipetsk Aviation School began, which was intended to train future Soviet pilots, but in 1924 the school closed without having time to organize itself.
Object "Lipetsk" German aviation school
Fokker D.XIII fighters in Lipetsk.
Research activities in the field of aircraft construction and research into materials for military aircraft in Germany, within the framework of the restrictions imposed by the Versailles Agreement, were discontinued. However, some studies could be carried out abroad, in particular in the USSR.
The opening of a German aviation school in the USSR had been planned since 1924. The document on the creation of the school on April 15, 1925 in Moscow was signed by the head of the Red Army Air Force P.I. Baranov and the representative of the Sondergroup R, Colonel H. von der Lith-Tomsen. The creation of the school was supervised by the “Aviation Inspectorate No. 1” of the German Defense Department. The use of the airfield and school facilities was free; all costs for complete equipment were borne by the German side. About 2 million marks were allocated annually for the maintenance of the school.
The Germans in a very short time reconstructed the production facilities, erected two small hangars, a repair shop, and already on July 15, 1925, a joint flight-tactical school was opened. Initially, the material base was 50 Fokker D-XIII fighters purchased by Vogru with funds from the Ruhr Fund in the Netherlands in 1923-1925. On June 28, 1925, the planes arrived from Stettin to Leningrad on the ship Edmund Hugo Stinnes. Transport aircraft and bombers were also purchased. Flight training took place over 5-6 months. The school was led by Major V. Shtar, and the position of a Soviet deputy, a representative of the Red Army, was also provided.
In the summer, during the flight period, the ground staff numbered over 200 people; in winter, the figure decreased. In 1932, the total number of personnel of the center reached 303 people: 43 German and 26 Soviet cadets, 234 workers, employees and technical specialists. The leadership of the Reichswehr strictly controlled all the details of the activities of joint structures on the territory of the USSR, and special attention was paid to secrecy. German pilots wore Soviet uniforms without insignia.
Research work was carried out at the school, for which the German General Staff secretly acquired material abroad. The practical training course for pilots included practicing air combat, bombing from various positions, studying weapons and equipment for aircraft - machine guns, cannons, optical instruments, etc.
During the entire period of operation of the school, only about 700 pilots underwent combat training there, including about 120 German pilots and 100 technical personnel.
In the early 1930s, even before Hitler came to power in Germany, German participation in the project began to noticeably decline. Already at the negotiations in November 1931, the German side avoided discussing the possibility of turning the aviation school in Lipetsk into a large joint research center. This happened due to the rapprochement of the USSR with other Western European countries, in particular with France. The Treaty of Rapallo, signed between the RSFSR and the Weimar Republic in 1922, began to lose its relevance. On September 15, 1933, the Lipetsk project was closed, the buildings erected by German specialists, and a significant part of the equipment were transferred to the Soviet side.
Higher Flight Tactical School of the Air Force
Since January 1934, the Air Force Higher Flight Tactical School began operating on the basis of the liquidated facility.
After the Great Patriotic War, it was re-equipped with jet aircraft, and a new training aviation regiment was added, which trained command personnel for long-range aviation units. During the same period, two airfields were built: the first with a concrete surface, in the Venus area, the second with a dirt surface, in the area of the village of Kuzminskie Otverzhki.
4th Center for Combat Use and Retraining of Air Force Flight Personnel
Coat of arms of the Lipetsk Aviation Center
The 4th Air Force Combat Operations Center was formed in Tambov on April 19, 1953. In 1954 it was transferred to Voronezh, and in 1960 to Lipetsk, after which it was transformed into the 4th center for combat use and retraining of Air Force flight personnel.
More than 45 thousand officers of various specialties were trained in the training department of the center during the Soviet period. At the Lipetsk Aviation Center, 11 Soviet pilot-cosmonauts were also retrained for new types of aircraft. As a symbol of the glorious aviation history of Lipetsk, in August 1969, a monument was erected on Aviators Square - a MiG-19 fighter soaring upward.
After the collapse of the USSR, the military-industrial complex degraded, the army budget was significantly reduced and, as a result, difficult times came for the Lipetsk aviation center. Only in 2003 did changes for the better begin: fuel limits increased and the material base began to strengthen.
In July 2003, on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of Lipetsk, an hour and a half air show took place. A delegation of French military pilots, headed by General Jean Romuald Robert, arrived for this event. The delegation arrived on two C-130 military transport aircraft, three Mirage fighters and F-200 attack aircraft.
On April 22, 2004, the aviation center was visited by Russian President V.V. Putin and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who arrived in Lipetsk for the opening of the Italian Ariston enterprise. Aviation equipment was demonstrated in action, aerobatic maneuvers were shown, including the most complex ones, with the personal participation of the head of the center, Alexander Kharchevsky.
Lipetsk center for combat use and retraining of flight personnel, aerobatic team "Russian Falcons" at MAKS-2009.
On August 3, 2007, the newest Russian fighter-bomber Su-34 took off from the test airfield of the Novosibirsk Aviation Industrial Association. Under the control of GLITs pilots Sergei Shcherbina and Alexander Ashchenkov, the plane arrived at the Lipetsk Aviation Center, where it was solemnly received and entered service in the Air Force.
Front-line bombers Su-24 and Su-34 of the Lipetsk pulp and paper plant and PLS took part in the parade on Red Square on May 9, 2008 in honor of the 63rd anniversary of the Great Victory over Nazi Germany. The Su-34 was personally flown by the head of the aviation center, Major General A. N. Kharchevsky.
In 2011, the military prosecutor's office of the Western Military District opened a criminal case into extortion of money from pilots of the Lipetsk Aviation Center. According to Interfax, the basis for this was the information contained in the Internet address of Senior Lieutenant Igor Sulim, which was confirmed during the audit. The defendants in the case initiated under Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation were the commander of the military unit, Colonel Eduard Kovalsky and his deputy for educational work, Colonel Sergei Sidorenko.
