The pilot is a hero of the Soviet Union who committed an aerial ramming. First night air ram

Neither the Testament nor the Koran will help now.
Why push on an empty trigger?..
There's a plane ahead - I'm going to ram,
Feeling every cell with the brain.
Morozovlit

IN The air ram of World War II is not always a gesture of despair and heroic suicide.
For an experienced Soviet pilot, this was a type of combat in which the maneuver killed the enemy, but the pilot and his vehicle remained unharmed.

On November 5, 1941, a circular was sent to combat units of the German Air Force Reichsmarshal Goering, which demanded: “... do not approach Soviet aircraft closer than 100 meters to avoid ramming.” This decision was made at the direction of Hitler after a long period of “persuasion” from the commanders of the air units, who considered such “tactics” humiliating for the famous aces of the Reich. After all, just recently the Fuhrer himself told them: “The Slavs will never understand anything about air warfare - this is the weapon of powerful people, the German form of combat.” “No one will ever be able to achieve air superiority over the German aces!” - echoed the commander of the fascist Air Force Goering.

But the air rams of the first days of the war made us forget these boastful speeches. And this was the first disgrace of the “German form of combat” and the first moral victory of the Soviet pilots.

Until June 22, 1941, fascist pilots in Europe did not have to encounter such a tactical technique as an air ram. But on the very first day of the attack on the USSR, the Luftwaffe immediately lost 16 aircraft as a result of ramming attacks by Soviet pilots.

On June 22, 1941, at 4:25 a.m., the first air ram of World War II was carried out near the city of Dubno, Rivne region.

It was committed by a native of the village of Chizhovo, Shchelkovsky district (now part of the city of Fryazino), Moscow region, deputy squadron commander of the 46th Fighter Aviation Regiment senior lieutenant Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov.

At dawn on June 22, 1941, Senior Lieutenant Ivanov took off on a combat alert at the head of an I-16 flight to intercept a group of German aircraft approaching the Mlynov airfield. In the air, our pilots discovered 6 He-111 bombers. Ivanov led the unit into an attack on the enemy. The Heinkel gunners opened fire on the fighters. Coming out of the dive, our planes repeated the attack. One of the bombers was shot down. The rest, dropping bombs randomly, began to leave to the west. After the attack, both wingmen went to their airfield, since they had used up almost all their fuel while maneuvering. Ivanov also decided to land. At this time, another He-111 appeared over the airfield. Ivanov rushed towards him. He soon ran out of ammunition and was running out of fuel. Then, in order to prevent the bombing of the airfield, Ivanov went for a ram. From the impact, the Heinkel, piloted, as it later turned out, by non-commissioned officer H. Wohlfeil, lost control, crashed into the ground and exploded on its bombs. The entire crew died. But Ivanov’s plane was also damaged. Due to the low altitude, the pilot was unable to use a parachute and died.

On August 2, 1941, senior lieutenant Ivanov I.I. posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Around the same time as Ivanov, near the Polish city of Zambrów Dmitry Kokorev he hit a fascist intelligence officer with a ram, leaving to the west with photographic film. Then the Soviet pilot made an emergency landing and returned to his regiment on foot.

At 5.15 near Galich, having destroyed one Junkers by fire, it rammed the second Leonid Butelin. The Soviet lightweight died, but the enemy’s bombs did not fall on the combat positions of our troops.

At 5.20, repelling a raid by enemy planes on Pruzhany, near Brest, he shot down a Xe-111, and destroyed the second one by ramming his burning “hawk”, mortally wounded Stepan Gudimov.

Between six and seven o'clock in the morning a fascist plane was hit by a ramming attack. Vasily Loboda in the Shavli region in the Baltic states. Died...

At 7.00 over the airfield in Cherlyany, having shot down an enemy plane, rammed the second one and died a hero’s death Anatoly Protasov.

At 8.30, having driven a group of Junkers away from the airfield and continuing patrolling over it, Evgeny Panfilov and Georgy Alaev entered into battle with a group of "Messers", and when Alaev's plane was shot down and Panfilov ran out of ammunition, he went to ram, thereby driving the enemies away from the airfield. He landed by parachute.

At 10.00 in an unequal battle over Brest (four of our planes against eight fascist ones) rammed the enemy Peter Ryabtsev, soon rose into the sky again.

The list of heroic rams on the first day of the war was continued on different sectors of the front, Alexander Moklyak over Bessarabia, Nikolay Ignatiev in the Kharkov region, Ivan Kovtun over the city of Stry...

22 June 1941 pilot Andrey Stepanovich Danilov single-handedly took on nine enemy aircraft. He managed to shoot down two bombers, but at that time enemy fighters appeared. A fascist shell hit the wing of the seagull, and Danilov was wounded by a shrapnel. The watch in his breast pocket saved his life and protected him from a bullet. The pilot saw the self-confident face of the German pilot and understood that his plane would soon be shot by the Nazis. And then Danilov, having wasted all the ammunition, pointed his “seagull” at the enemy and rammed the wing of the “Messerschmitt” with its propeller.

The enemy fighter began to fall. The Chaika also lost control, but with a desperate effort of will, the experienced pilot Danilov, bleeding, took the plane into horizontal flight and, with the landing gear retracted, managed to land it in a field of rye.

The first air ram in the skies of the Moscow region was carried out by the deputy squadron commander of the 177th Fighter Aviation Regiment of the 6th Fighter Aviation Corps of the Air Defense Forces junior lieutenant Viktor Vasilyevich Talalikhin. On the night of August 7, 1941, he shot down a Xe-111 bomber on an I-16 near Podolsk. On August 8, 1941, “for the exemplary performance of combat missions of the command on the front of the fight against German fascism and the courage and heroism shown,” he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

The first ramming of an enemy mechanized column by plane was carried out by a resident of the village of Khlebnikovo near Moscow (now part of the city of Dolgoprudny), during the war - Squadron commander Captain Nikolai Frantsevich Gastello.

On June 26, 1941, a flight under the command of Captain Gastello, consisting of two DB-3f heavy bombers, flew to the Molodechno area. The second plane was flown senior lieutenant Fyodor Vorobyov, flew with him as a navigator Lieutenant Anatoly Rybas. During an attack on a concentration of German equipment, Gastello's plane was shot down. According to the reports of Vorobyov and Rybas, Gastello’s burning plane rammed a mechanized column of enemy equipment. At night, peasants from a nearby village removed the corpses of the pilots from the plane and, wrapping the bodies in parachutes, buried them near the crash site of the bomber.

On July 5, 1941, in the evening report of the Soviet Information Bureau, Gastello’s feat was mentioned for the first time: “The squadron commander, Captain Gastello, performed a heroic feat. An enemy anti-aircraft shell hit the gasoline tank of his plane. The fearless commander sent the plane engulfed in flames towards a concentration of enemy vehicles and gasoline tanks. Dozens of German vehicles and tanks exploded along with the hero’s plane.”

On July 26, 1941, Gastello was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. In Dolgoprudny, next to school No. 3, named after Nikolai Gastello, a monument to the Hero was erected.

The mighty will of the Creator of the world.
She called him to a great feat.
And crowns the hero with eternal glory.
She chose him as an instrument of vengeance...

Staff Captain P.N. Nesterov

Aerial ramming as a form of air combat

In 1908, a large article “On the military significance of airplanes” appeared on the pages of the newspaper “Russian Invalid”, the official publication of the military department. In it, the author put forward the idea of ​​​​bringing in special combat airplanes, “intended for squadron combat in the air,” to fight “for state supremacy in the air.”

At the same time, the author believed that: “(an airplane is) a flying machine ... is generally fragile and therefore any collision with opponents in the air, chest to chest, must inevitably end in the death of both aircraft colliding on board. There can be neither a winner nor a loser here, therefore, it must be a battle with maneuvering.” A few years later, the author of the article’s prediction was confirmed. In June 1912, the first air collision in the history of world aviation took place at a military airfield in Douai (France). While performing morning flights in the air at an altitude of 50 m, biplanes piloted by Captain Dubois and Lieutenant Penian collided. When they fell, both aviators died. In October 1912, a similar incident occurred in Germany, in May 1913 - in Russia. At the Gatchina airfield of the aviation department of the Officers' Aeronautical School (JSC OVSh), during training flights at an altitude of 12 - 16 m, the Nieuport of Lieutenant V.V. collided. Dybovsky and “Farman” Lieutenant A.A. Kovanko. The pilots escaped with minor bruises.

In total, during the period from 1912 to the start of the First World War, air collisions accounted for 6% of the total number of accidents in world aviation.

In order to avoid an air collision during troop maneuvers, Russian and foreign pilots were strongly recommended to fight at a certain distance from each other. The idea of ​​an air battle itself was not rejected by the military department. To conduct it, it was proposed to arm airplanes with guns or automatic weapons. This idea was reflected in the already mentioned article “On the military significance of airplanes”: “A gun, maybe a light machine gun, a few hand grenades - that’s all that can make up the armament of a flying projectile. Such weapons are quite sufficient to disable an enemy airplane and force it to descend, because a rifle bullet that hits successfully will stop the engine or put an aeronaut out of action, as will a successfully hit hand grenade, at close ranges thrown by hand, and at longer distances. long distance - from the same gun.”

In the fall of 1911, during large maneuvers of the troops of the Warsaw Military District, according to a pre-approved plan, two airplanes carried out a successful attack on a mock enemy airship. According to the district command, the presence of on-board weapons could lead to the destruction of the controlled balloon. But the absence of this urgently required the search for other forms of influence on the enemy aircraft.

A certain sensation among pilots was caused by the proposal of one of the theorists of domestic military aviation, mechanical engineer Lieutenant N.A. Yatsuka. In the summer of 1911, he published an article “On Air Combat” in the journal “Bulletin of Aeronautics”, where he wrote: “It is possible that in exceptional cases pilots will decide to ram someone else’s airplane with their airplane.”

In his work “Aeronautics in Naval Warfare” (1912), Nikolai Alexandrovich supported the idea of ​​​​an “air ram” that he had previously voiced, but with a different meaning. “It is not impossible,” wrote Yatsuk, “that the next war will show us cases when an aeronautical vehicle, in order to interfere with the reconnaissance of an enemy air force, will sacrifice itself by hitting it in order to cause its fall, at least at the cost of its death. Techniques of this kind are, of course, extreme. The fight in the air will be the bloodiest in terms of the number of people participating in it, since the damaged vehicles will, for the most part, quickly fall to the ground with all their crews.” However, his views remained unclaimed due to insufficient knowledge of the very nature of air combat.

The acting military pilot perceived the idea of ​​an air ram differently than others. commander of the 11th corps aviation detachment of the 3rd aviation company, Lieutenant P.N. Nesterov, seeing in it the possibility of turning an aircraft into a military weapon.

At the autumn large maneuvers of the troops of the Kyiv Military District in 1913, he showed in practice how it was possible to force an air enemy to refuse to carry out his mission. Taking advantage of the advantage in speed (about 20 km/h), Pyotr Nikolaevich, in his Nieuport-IV apparatus, imitated the attack of Farman-VII, piloted by Lieutenant V.E. Hartmann, forcing the latter to periodically change the course of his flight. “After the fourth attack, Hartmann shook his fist at Nesterov and flew back without completing reconnaissance.” This was the first simulation of air combat in domestic practice.

Lieutenant P. N. Nesterov near the Nieuport IV aircraft.
11th Corps Aviation Detachment

After landing, Nesterov was told that such an attack on an enemy airplane was only possible in peacetime, and in war these maneuvers were unlikely to have any effect on the enemy. Pyotr Nikolaevich thought for a moment and then answered with conviction: “It will be possible to hit him from above with the wheels.” Subsequently, the pilot repeatedly returned to the issue of ramming and proved its possibility, while allowing for two options.

The first is to rise above the enemy airplane, and then, in a steep dive, hit the end of the enemy’s wing with its wheels: the enemy airplane will be shot down, but you can glide safely. The second is to crash the propeller into the enemy’s tail and break his rudders. The propeller will shatter into pieces, but it is possible to glide safely. We must not forget that there were no parachutes yet.

In foreign countries in the pre-war years, air combat between airplanes was initially denied. For example, in Germany, where the rapid development of aviation began in 1912, the latter were considered only as means of reconnaissance and communications. The airplanes were armed with light small arms in the form of a revolver or carbine in case of a forced landing behind enemy lines. Meanwhile, the first successful tests of aviation as an air strike weapon during the Tripolitan (1911 - 1912) and 1st Balkan (1912 - 1913) wars convinced many leading European countries of the need to create special combat airplanes. At this time, information appeared that a special metal, high-speed fighter airplane had been built in Germany, which had undergone successful experimental tests. This was the reason for the Frenchman R. Esnault-Peltry to develop, together with artillery specialists, a project for the same fighter. Detailed characteristics were strictly confidential.

After the maneuvers of the St. Petersburg Military District in Russia in August 1913, the question openly arose about the need to form fighter aviation in the Russian army and arm airplanes with automatic weapons to combat enemy reconnaissance aircraft. However, by the beginning of the war, the aviation units of the Russian army remained practically unarmed.

The airplane as a means of armed struggle

The beginning of the First World War was characterized by the intensity of flights by aircraft of the warring parties, mainly for reconnaissance purposes. Already at the beginning of the war, their first combat clashes in the air were recorded. The main means of defeating the enemy used in air combat was the pilot's personal weapon. For pistol fire to be effective, it was necessary to get close to the enemy airplane at a distance of up to 50 m. Simultaneously with the fire, the pilots used the so-called. “intimidation technique,” ​​that is, active maneuvering near an enemy vehicle with the threat of colliding with it in the air in order to force the enemy to abandon the assigned task.

On August 17, 1914, the following information was published on the pages of the daily newspaper “Russkoe Slovo”: “An interesting message has been received about an air fight between Russian and German pilots. An enemy airplane unexpectedly appeared above the line of Russian troops. Our pilot expressed a desire to force the German to come down. He quickly took off, approached the enemy and forced him to land with a series of turns. The German pilot has been arrested." Subsequently, this technique was used repeatedly.

This circumstance led the Russian command to think about the possibility of using captured equipment for the needs of the Russian army. The commanders of aviation detachments at the front were now strongly recommended, if possible, not to destroy, but to forcibly land enemy aircraft. Later, within the walls of the capital’s plant of the Joint Stock Aeronautics Company of V. A. Lebedev, they received a new life. There were reasons for this. Firstly, the military department assessed the cost of restoration and newly built airplanes in the same way. Secondly, familiarity with foreign technologies and technical solutions made it possible to enrich one’s own design experience.

However, according to the pilots themselves, a forced landing could only affect a single enemy aircraft, while their group raid required other methods of influence, up to and including the destruction of the latter. This opinion was also shared by the staff captain of the 9th Siberian Rifle Brigade P.N. Nesterov, at the beginning of the war, commander of the 11th corps aviation detachment of the 3rd Army of the Southwestern Front (SWF). He believed that if the enemy does not stop flying over our territory and refuses to surrender, he must be shot down. To resolve this issue, it was necessary to arm the airplanes with light machine guns, which was confirmed in one of the orders of the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. It stated, in particular: “In order to combat enemy aircraft, it seems necessary to arm the most heavy-duty of our airplanes. For which it is recognized that it is necessary to use Madsen automatic rifles.” However, at that time there were not enough automatic weapons to reach the established kit in field units.

The lack of reliable weapons in aviation, the absurd “valuable instructions” of military officials “to shoot buckshot from hand ...” forced Nesterov and other aviators to invent exotic weapons like a bomb “suspended on a long cable ... to destroy enemy airships”, to lower “thin copper wire from the tail of the aircraft with a load, so that, having cut off the path of an enemy plane, break its propeller”, “adapt a saw-tooth knife to the tail of the plane and ... rip open the shell of airships and tethered observation balloons with it”, throw “artillery shells instead of bombs”.

Without abandoning the views of N.A. Yatsuk on the use of power (ramming) strikes, Pyotr Nikolaevich was still a supporter of technical and maneuverable methods of fighting the enemy. Unfortunately, the tragic death of a remarkable pilot excluded the possibility of implementing his inventions in the Russian school of air combat.

Hunting for the "Albatross" - a step into immortality

During the Battle of Gorodok (September 5 - 12, 1914), the Austro-Hungarian command attempted to defeat the Russian 3rd and 8th armies of the Southwestern Front. But the counteroffensive that followed on September 4 in the zone of our three armies (9th, 4th and 5th) forced the enemy troops to begin a hasty retreat. Within a few days, our advanced units reached and captured the important center of Eastern Galicia - Lvov. Preparations for the upcoming operations required a large regrouping of troops. To reveal their new positions, locations of military command and control bodies, firing points, field airfields, and transport networks, the enemy made extensive use of his air forces. In addition to collecting intelligence information in the near rear of the Russian troops, enemy pilots, whenever possible, bombed our military installations, including the airfield of the 11th corps air detachment. On September 7, one of the Austrian airplanes dropped a bomb on his airfield “(a sample of an artillery shell), which, having fallen, was buried in the sand and did not explode.”

One of the prominent Austrian observer pilots, Lieutenant Baron von Friedrich Rosenthal, owner of vast lands in Eastern Galicia, was involved in combat work. He made his flights on an Albatross-type airplane, designed and built with his personal participation. In the area of ​​special attention of the enemy apparatus was the city of Zholkiev, Lviv region, where the estate of Baron F. Rosenthal was located, temporarily occupied by the headquarters of the 3rd Russian Army. The appearance of enemy aircraft in this area caused extreme irritation among the army command. Senior commanders immediately accused the flight crew of the 3rd Aviation Company of insufficient activity in the fight against enemy air.

On September 7, 1914, Quartermaster General of the Army Headquarters, Major General M.D. Bonch-Bruevich demanded that the pilots exclude Austrian flights in the Russian rear. Staff Captain P.N. Nesterov promised to take drastic measures to solve this problem.

Initially, the issue of air ramming was not raised at all. Considering the possibility of the Albatross appearing unescorted (previously it had flown in a group of three airplanes), it was decided to capture it by force landing. For this purpose, on the morning of September 8, P.N. Nesterov with his deputy lieutenant A.A. Kovanko worked out this option over the airfield. However, further events began to develop according to a different scenario. Already at the start, Nesterov’s single-seat airplane lost its load with a cable, which he expected to use when meeting with the enemy. During landing after a training flight, the engine suddenly malfunctioned, and at the direction of Pyotr Nikolaevich, the mechanics began checking its valves. The appearance of an enemy Albatross in the sky was an unpleasant surprise for Russian pilots. Without waiting for the troubleshooting on his device, Nesterov rushed to Kovanko’s car. In order not to risk his life, Pyotr Nikolaevich categorically refused to fly with his deputy.

Rapidly gaining a height of up to 1500 m on the Morane-Saulnier type (Morane-Saulnier G) (according to other sources - up to 2000 m), he attacked the Albatross from top to bottom. Witnesses of this unusual battle saw that after a sharp collision the enemy airplane nosed down and began to fall randomly. Nesterov’s apparatus swept further, then began to descend in a spiral. At an altitude of about 50 m, the Moran swayed sharply and it fell down like a stone. At that moment, the figure of the pilot separated from the apparatus.

Scheme of P. N. Nesterov’s ram

Map of the airplane crash site

Air ram. World War I period poster. 1914

When examining Nesterov’s corpse, doctors witnessed a fracture of his spine and minor damage to his skull. According to their conclusion, the spinal fracture could not have been caused by a fall on soft ground. Staff Captain P.N. Nesterov died in the air as a result of an airplane collision. The pilots who knew Pyotr Nikolaevich closely immediately doubted his deliberate ramming of the enemy air force. They believed that Nesterov had intentions to force the Albatross crew to land on the airfield, holding it through skillful maneuvering under the threat of using a ram. Pyotr Nikolaevich himself, who was well aware of the statistics of air collisions in the pre-war period and the high percentage of deaths, did not see the ram as a particular benefit for the small Russian aviation, where each device was worth its weight in gold. During the period August - September 1914 alone, the loss of airplanes in the active Russian army amounted to 94 airplanes (45% of the total).

The “Report of the Investigation into the Circumstances of the Heroic Death of the Head of the 11th Corps Aviation Detachment, Staff Captain Nesterov” stated: “Staff Captain Nesterov has long expressed the opinion that it is possible to shoot down an enemy aircraft by hitting the wheels of your own aircraft from above on the supporting surfaces of the enemy aircraft, Moreover, he admitted the possibility of a successful outcome for the ramming pilot.”

Therefore, most experts agreed that he made an attempt to attack the enemy airplane with a glancing blow, counting on the psychological effect. According to theoretical calculations, the tangential impact of a light single-seat aircraft could not lead to the destruction of a heavier airplane, such as the three-seat Albatross with a bomb load. This required either an apparatus of equal weight or a strike with the entire body of the attacking airplane. It seems that Nesterov had technical calculations for carrying out an aerial ramming in relation to a single-seater vehicle based on the attack of an enemy aircraft of equal mass. The possibility of an air attack in this way by heavy types of airplanes was not even discussed. But, ironically, this is exactly the situation that has developed in the skies of Eastern Galicia. Directing his car at the Austrian airplane, Nesterov lost sight of the fact that he had a heavier and less maneuverable two-seater Moran-Saulnier type “J”. As a result, instead of a tangential impact with the wheels on the wings of the enemy car, he crashed into it with the engine between two supporting surfaces, which led to a complete loss of control and destruction of the latter. This blow, according to the official version, caused the death of the Russian pilot himself.

In his book “Khodynka: Russian Aviation Runway,” aviation history specialist A. A. Demin cites an assessment of the tragic event made by the famous Soviet scientist V. S. Pyshnov.

Analyzing the ram, he, in particular, noted that the Moran had a very poor forward-down view and it was difficult to accurately determine the distance and “jewelfully” hit the Albatross with just its wheels. It is possible that turbulent flows from both airplanes and their mutual influence could have contributed. And then, according to Pyshnov, the following could happen: “If the Moran-Zh aircraft had only one elevator of a symmetrical profile, without a fixed part - a stabilizer, the aircraft could not fly with the handle thrown. Since a diving moment acted on the wing in the absence of lift, in the event of a thrown stick, the plane had to go into a dive with a further transition to inverted flight. As is known, after the ramming, which occurred at an altitude of about 1000 m, to the height of P.N. Nesterov was performing a spiral descent, but then the plane went into a dive and fell in an inverted position. This behavior of the aircraft indicates that P. Nesterov lost consciousness and released the control stick; after going into negative angles of attack and negative value... (G) he was thrown out of the aircraft because he was not tied down...".

Based on the analysis, it can be assumed that the pilot lost consciousness not at the moment of the ramming strike, but much later, during a steep spiral due to weakness of the vestibular apparatus. About P.N.’s health problems Nesterov at the front was later mentioned by his colleagues, in particular the military pilot V.G. Sokolov, who witnessed Pyotr Nikolaevich's deep fainting after another flight. The intensity of his work is reflected in the combat activity log of the 11th Corps Aviation Detachment. During the period from August 10 to September 8, 1914, he completed 12 combat missions, the total flight time was 18 hours 39 minutes. The last of them (September 8) took only 15 minutes and cost the Russian pilot his life.

Nesterov’s body was soon discovered 6 km from the town of Zholkiev in a dry field near a swamp between an airplane and a motor. 400 m away from him lay a downed Albatross, partially buried in swampy soil. The corpses of two members of his crew (Lieutenant F. Rosenthal and non-commissioned officer F. Malina) were discovered immediately. According to some reports, the body of the third crew member, whose name has not been established, was found much later.

For his unprecedented feat, staff captain P.N. Nesterov was the first among Russian pilots to be posthumously awarded the Order of St. George, 4th degree, and promoted to the rank of captain. The deceased hero was buried on September 13, 1914 at Askold’s grave in Kyiv. Later, the ashes of the Russian pilot were transferred to the Lukyanovskoe cemetery in the capital of Ukraine.

Nesterov's legacy

The tragic outcome of Nesterov’s air ramming at the beginning cast doubt on the possibility of the pilot who carried it out to survive.

Doubts were dispelled by another Russian pilot - Lieutenant of the 12th Uhlan Belgorod Regiment A. A. Kozakov, who during an air battle with the two-seater German “Albatross” S.I on March 31, 1915, managed to shoot it down with a “Nesterov” sliding impact with wheels from above. During the First World War, Kozakov was recognized as the most successful pilot in Russia.

He became acquainted with the advanced views of P. N. Nesterov on the fight against enemy aircraft thanks to the hero’s younger brother Mikhail, a pilot of the Brest-Litovsk corps air squad, who tragically died in the fall of 1914 in a plane crash.

Later, the Allies (the British) recognized the air ram (we are talking about a tangential strike) as one of the forms of Russian air combat, pointing out that when they (Russian pilots) do not have bombs, they rise above the enemy airplane, and, flying over it, they hit him with the bottom of their airplane.

The subsequent equipping of aircraft with automatic weapons relegated aerial rams to the background. It would seem that they inevitably had to go down in history. But in our country they did not abandon the ideas of Pyotr Nesterov, and for a long time the air ram terrified enemies, and the fearlessness of Soviet pilots aroused sincere admiration and respect in the world. The practice of aerial boarding (ramming) was inherent in the flight personnel of fighter aircraft of the Air Force and Air Defense Forces for a long time and has not lost its relevance today (in exceptional cases, such a method of air combat is quite possible).

Back in the fall of 1914, Russian society came up with a proposal to perpetuate the memory of the brave pilot. Mr. A. S. Zholkevich (editor of the newspaper “Novoye Vremya”) took the initiative, starting to collect money with the aim of acquiring several acres of land at the site of the hero’s death for the construction of a memorial obelisk. In the same year, a memorial cross was erected in the area of ​​Zholkiev, and later a monument was erected.

Nowadays, monuments to the brave Russian pilot have been unveiled in Kyiv and Nizhny Novgorod, a memorial bust has been erected in Kazan, asteroid No. 3071 has been named after him. A special state award of the Russian Federation has been established in honor of P. N. Nesterov - the Nesterov Medal.

The grave of P. N. Nesterov in Kyiv. Modern look

Monument to P. N. Nesterov in Kyiv on Pobeda Avenue.
Sculptor E. A. Karpov, architect A. Snitsarev

Memorial plaque in Kyiv on a house on Moskovskaya street,
where the pilot P. N. Nesterov lived in 1914

Monument to P.N. Nesterov in Nizhny Novgorod.
The authors of the project are sculptors Honored Artist of the RSFSR A. I. Rukavishnikov and People’s Artist of the RSFSR, Corresponding Member
Academy of Arts of the USSR I. M. Rukavishnikov

Memorial sign at the site of the death of P. N. Nesterov

Alexey Lashkov,
senior researcher at the Research Institute
Institute of Military History of the Military Academy
General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation,
Candidate of Historical Sciences

"I want everything..."

Russian pilot Pyotr Nesterov; Nesterov's ram (postcard from the 1st World War); Russian pilot Alexander Kozakov

Canadian ace William Bishop; Coppens's HD-1 "Henrio" breaks away from the "Draken" it rammed; Belgian ace Willie Coppens

Soviet pilot Evgeny Stepanov; Japanese pilot Shogo Saito; Polish pilot Leopold Pamula

Ray Holmes in the cockpit of his Hurricane; Ray Holmes ram

"Killer Fau" Joseph Berry
so Berry and many other British pilots rammed German V-1 missiles

Bulgarian pilots Dimitar Spisarevski and Nedelcho Bonchev

Predecessor of the "kamikaze" Yoichi Tomonaga
Attack of the torpedo bomber "Kate", filmed from the aircraft carrier "Yorktown" during the Battle of Midway Atoll.
This is what Tomonaga's last attack looked like (it is quite possible that it was his plane that was filmed)

Similar kamikaze attacks terrified American sailors

German pilots: fighter ace Hermann Graf and attack ace Alvin Boerst

Commander of fighter-attack squadrons Walter Dahl; Werner Gert, who rammed 3 Fortresses;
Vili Maksimovich, who destroyed 7 “Fortresses” with rams

The assault version of the FW-190 fighter, equipped with a fully armored cabin and solid armored glass, allowed German pilots
get close to the “Flying Fortresses” and carry out a killer ram

A manned analogue of the V-1 rocket - Fieseler Fi 103R Reichenberg, and the inspiration for the idea of ​​​​the “German kamikaze” Hana Reich

Conclusion:

Alexey Stepanov, Petr Vlasov
Samara

Hubert Heckmann 25.05. 1944 rams Captain Joe Bennett's Mustang, depriving the American fighter squadron of leadership

When was the first air ram of the Great Patriotic War carried out?

Sofia Vargan

When it comes to talking about ramming attacks carried out by Soviet pilots during the Great Patriotic War, Nikolai Gastello is usually remembered, who threw his plane at a German column on June 26, 1941 near Radoshkovichi.

True, they are still arguing about who exactly was the author of the ram, the captain or captain Maslov - both planes did not return to the airfield. But that's not the point. The ram, widely known as the “Gastello feat,” is not an air ram, it is a ram for a ground target, it was also called a fire ram.

And now we will talk specifically about air rams - a targeted collision of an aircraft with a target in the air.

For the first time in the world, the ramming of an air target was carried out on August 26, 1914 by the famous pilot (he was also the author of the “dead loop”, which is also called the “Nesterov loop”). Nesterov, in a light Moran aircraft, rammed a heavy Austrian Albatross. As a result of the ramming, the enemy plane was shot down, but Nesterov was also killed. A ramming strike was written into the history of the art of piloting aircraft, but was considered an extreme measure, fatal for the pilot who decided to do it.

And now - the first day of the Great Patriotic War. “Today, the twenty-second of June, at 4 o’clock in the morning, without a declaration of war, German troops attacked our country...” - the voice reading out the statement of the Soviet government about the German attack on the USSR was heard in all corners of the country, except those where fighting was already taking place . Well, yes, those who suddenly found themselves on the front line did not need additional messages. They have already seen the enemy.

Many airfields were lost in the first minutes of hostilities - in accordance with the proven blitzkrieg tactics, German aviation bombed sleeping airfields. But not all. Some of the equipment was saved by lifting the planes into the air. So they entered the battle - in the first minutes from the beginning of the war.

Soviet pilots had only a theoretical idea about a ramming attack. This is understandable; it has never occurred to anyone to practice this technique in practice. Moreover, the history of aviation clearly defined a ramming strike as fatal to the pilot. And so - in the very first minutes of the war, the ramming began! And, most interestingly, not all of them turned out to be fatal.

It is almost impossible to determine who exactly carried out the first aerial ramming in the war. June 22 at about 5 a.m. senior lieutenant Ivan Ivanov, who served in the 46th Fighter Aviation Regiment, rammed a Heinkel-111 in the Mlynov area (Ukraine). The pilot died during the ramming; he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously.

First ram? Maybe. But here - on June 22 at about 5 o'clock in the morning, junior lieutenant Dmitry Kokorev, who served in the 124th Fighter Aviation Regiment, rammed a Messerschmitt in the Zambrova area. Kokorev remained alive after the ramming, was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for his feat, and died on October 12, 1941 near Leningrad.

June 22 at 5:15 a.m. junior lieutenant Leonid Buterin, who served in the 12th Fighter Aviation Regiment, rammed a Junkers-88 in the Stanislav area (Western Ukraine). He died during the ramming. On June 22, at about 6 a.m., an unknown pilot on a U-2 plane (they were also affectionately called “ears”) rammed a Messerschmitt in the Vyhoda area (near Bialystok). He died during the ramming.

June 22 at about 10 a.m. Lieutenant Petr Ryabtsev, who served in the 123rd Fighter Aviation Regiment, rammed a Messerschmitt 109 over Brest. The pilot survived the ramming attack - he jumped out. Pyotr Ryabtsev died on July 31, 1941 in battles near Leningrad.

Young guys decided to carry out ramming attacks, defending their land from the enemy. They did not think that the ram was fatal. Moreover, they expected to destroy the enemy and survive. And, as it turned out, this is quite real. They wrote not only heroic pages in the history of the Great Patriotic War, but also a new page in the history of aviation - a ramming strike is no longer a technique that definitely leads to the death of the pilot! Moreover, it later turned out that even an airplane could be saved by ramming - after some rams, the pilots even managed to land a fully combat-ready aircraft (except that the landing gear was broken off as a result of the ramming).

But that was later. And in the first minutes and hours of the war, the pilots going to ram knew only one example - Pyotr Nesterov, a hero of the First World War. And they took mortal risks. Not for glory, for victory. The pilots who threw their aircraft into the ram believed in what they told the whole country: “Our cause is just! The enemy will be defeated, victory will be ours!”

“And we need only one victory, one for all, we will not stand behind the price,” they did not stand behind the price, paying the maximum, giving their own lives for the sake of this one for all. They didn’t think which one of them would be the first with his ram; it’s for us, the descendants, who are interested in finding that very Hero. And they didn’t even feel like heroes. Pyotr Ryabtsev wrote to his brother about his ram like this: “I’ve already clinked glasses in the sky with one of Hitler’s fellows. He drove him, the scoundrel, into the ground,” this is not a description of the feat, he was not proud of the ram, but of the fact that he destroyed one enemy!

“A deadly fire awaits us, and yet it is powerless...” - the fire was indeed deadly, but it turned out to be powerless against them, such amazing people.

Contrary to frequent statements, the first night air ram was carried out not by Viktor Talalikhin, but by another Russian pilot. Evgeniy Stepanov rammed an SM-81 bomber over Barcelona in October 1937.

He fought in Spain on the Republican side during the Civil War. Soon after the start of the Great Patriotic War, the night ram will glorify the young pilot Talalikhin.
Now historians write that during the Great Patriotic War the first night ram was carried out by Pyotr Eremeev, who served in the Moscow region in the 27th air regiment. He shot down a Ju-88 on the night of July 28-29 over the Istra region. Eremeev died a few weeks before Talalikhin - in early October 1941. However, his feat never became widely known, and he received the title of Hero posthumously only in 1995. Talalikhin became a symbol of the heroism of Soviet pilots.

Dreams of heaven

At the age of seventeen in September 1935, Talalikhin enrolled in a gliding club. By this time, the future ace had behind him a high school and a factory apprenticeship school at the Moscow meat processing plant, where the young man later worked. Perhaps his older brothers served as an example for Talalikhin: they were drafted into the army, and both ended up in aviation. But in the 30s, many Soviet boys dreamed of heaven.
A few months after the start of training in the circle, Talalikhin wrote in the factory newspaper that he made his first flight on a glider, completed the first stage of training with “good” and “excellent” marks, and hoped to continue studying. He declared that he wanted to fly like Chkalov, Belyakov and Baidukov - the names of these pilots were well known throughout the Soviet Union.

First flight and military school

In October 1936, Talalikhin was sent to the flying club. Despite his small stature, he successfully passed the medical examination and began training. The instructor noted that the young man has talent, but he needs a “cool head.” Talalikhin will gain composure and prudence during military service.
Talalikhin made his first flight on a U-2 in 1937, a few months before being drafted into the army. There the dream of the future ace came true - he was sent to the Chkalov military aviation school in Borisoglebsk. He studied diligently: Talalikhin later recalled that he got up at sunrise and returned to the barracks right before lights out. In addition to his studies, he spent a lot of time in the library: reading specialized literature, studying maps and instructions.
However, Talalikhin once had to end up in the guardhouse for violating flight safety regulations: during training, he performed several more aerobatic maneuvers than prescribed by the rules.
In 1938, he graduated from college with the rank of junior lieutenant and began serving in the 27th Fighter Aviation Regiment. Officers and teachers of the school noted that Talalikhin has courage, he makes the right decisions in difficult situations.

In the Finnish war

During the Soviet-Finnish War, Talalikhin carried out 47 combat missions. Already in the first battle, the junior pilot of the third squadron destroyed an enemy plane. Then Talalikhin flew the Chaika - I-153 (biplane). For his valor, the future ace received the Order of the Red Star.
In total, during the campaign Talalikhin shot down four planes. In one of the battles, he covered commander Mikhail Korolev, who was trying to intercept a German bomber and came under fire from a Finnish anti-aircraft battery. Talalikhin “separated” from the commander’s plane and destroyed the German Fokker (F-190). After the end of the Finnish campaign
Talalikhin spent about a month on vacation with his parents, and then was sent for retraining - advanced training courses for flight personnel. In the description at the end of them, Talalikhin was called worthy of becoming a flight commander. It was also said that he "flies boldly", is smart in the air, and successfully flies fighter planes.
In the spring of 1941, Korolev and Talalikhin met again: the young pilot was sent to the first squadron of the 177th Fighter Aviation Regiment, commanded by Korolev. His immediate commander was Vasily Gugashin.

The beginning of the Great Patriotic War

Soviet pilots carried out their first rams immediately after the start of the war. It is recorded that on June 22, 1941, seven pilots risked their lives and sent their planes to enemy aircraft. Ramming was a fatal risk for the pilot. Few survived - for example, Boris Kovzan shot down four planes in this way and each time landed successfully by parachute.
The squadron in which Talalikhin served was based near the city of Klin. Pilots began flying combat missions on July 21, after the first German air raid on Moscow. Then, thanks to the successful work of air defense and Soviet aviation, out of 220 bombers, only a few reached the city.
The task of the Soviet pilots was to detect fascist bombers and fighters, cut them off from the group and destroy them.
Talalikhin's regiment took its first battle on July 25. At that time, the ace was already deputy squadron commander, and soon Gugashin was unable to exercise command, and Talalikhin had to take over.

Night ram

On August 7, one of the last major German air attacks on Moscow took place. This was the sixteenth raid.
Talalikhin received an order to fly out to intercept bombers in the Podolsk area. The pilot later told reporters that he noticed a Heinkel-111 at an altitude of 4800 meters. He attacked and knocked out the right engine. The German plane turned around and flew back. The pilots began their descent. Talalikhin realized that he had run out of ammunition.
The search engines that discovered Talalikhin’s plane in 2014 have a version that the firing system was disabled. The ammunition was half spent, and the instrument panel was shot through. At the same time, Talalikhin was wounded in the arm.
He decided to go for a ram: at first there was a plan to “chop off” the tail of the German plane with a propeller, but in the end Talalikhin rammed the bomber with his entire I-16, which he called a “hawk.”
The Soviet pilot parachuted into a lake near the village of Mansurovo (now in the area of ​​Domodedovo Airport). He chose a long jump, fearing that the parachute canopy would be shot through by the Germans.
A German plane crashed near the village of Dobrynikha, its crew was killed. The Heinkel was commanded by a forty-year-old lieutenant colonel. The crash site of the downed plane had to be recorded, otherwise, according to the rules of Red Army aviation, the feat would not have been recognized. Local residents helped the military find him. There is even a photograph in which Talalikhin is captured in front of the Heinkel.
Radio interception recorded that the Germans called Talalikhin a “crazy Russian pilot” who destroyed a heavy bomber.
Talalikhin's feat was immediately reflected in newspapers and was talked about on the radio. The Soviet state needed heroes: stories about such actions raised the morale of soldiers. The day after the ram, Talalikhin received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. A decree about this appeared in the newspapers on August 9. Ace wrote to his brother Alexander that the award was a great honor for him. However, it seemed to him that he had not done anything special and that his brother in his place would have done the same.
On August 7, the day of Talalikhin’s feat, long-range Soviet aviation carried out the first bombing of Berlin, which infuriated the Nazi government.

Death of Talalikhin

While undergoing treatment, Talalikhin communicated a lot with young people and workers, and spoke at anti-fascist rallies. As soon as he was able to return to duty, he again began to shoot down enemy aircraft. By the end of October, he had shot down four German aircraft.
On October 27, Talalikhin’s group flew to cover the troops in the area of ​​​​the village of Kamenki. Approaching their destination, the pilots noticed Messerschmitts. Talalikhin managed to shoot down one of them, but soon three German planes were very close to him and opened fire. With the help of his partner Alexander Bogdanov, they managed to shoot down the second one, but almost immediately after this Talalikhin received a severe bullet wound to the head and was unable to control the plane.
Fragments of the plane were found. The pilot's body was sent to Moscow. He was buried at the Novodevichy cemetery.