Shocking battlefield footage from today shows Ukrainians cheer and applaud as they appear to shoot down two Russian aircrafts in the Chernihiv and Mykolaiv oblasts as forces were also earlier said to down a Russian helicopter near Kyiv.
This comes as Volodymyr Zelensky in an address this morning urged Ukrainians to continue fighting Putin’s forces.
The comic-turned-wartime president then thundered ‘what more is needed’ to convince Joe Biden to enforce a no-fly zone – an action which could widen the war and suck in NATO – after he accused the West of cowardice in the face of Russian aggression.
Video from the frontlines, shared on social media, showed clips of an aircraft dropping rapidly from the air as cheers from Ukrainians could be heard in the background.
Those who shared the content online say the incident was filmed in Chernihiv, in northern Ukraine.
Further video then shows two pilots parachuting as they flee the aircraft; photos and clips shared on Twitter claim one of the pilots survived while the second died.
More footage then showed the captured Russian pilot, bloodied from his escape, being questioned by Ukrainian forces as they demanded to know his name and orders.
In another video soldiers can be seen filming with the captured pilot as they get him to say ‘glory to Ukraine’. They can be heard asking ‘why were you bombing people’ ? As the man numbly replies that he was ordered to.
They then say, ‘you didn’t know anything?’, to which he replied that he didn’t, prompting the soldiers to say ‘that’s your (Russian soldiers’) favourite phrase’.
Ukrainian soldiers could then be seen calling someone on the pilot’s phone, seemingly saved under a pet name, with graphic threats of what they will do to him.
Another photo shared on Twitter appears to show a man, understood to be the captured pilot in the videos, standing next to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.
It is understood that the aircraft, which was shot down, is a Sukhoi Su-34; a fighter-bomber which had also been used in Syria.
A second Russian aircraft was also captured going down in the country’s Mykolaiv oblast; another video on Telegram seems to suggest the pilot was captured as a man was filmed being questioned.
A third video from this morning also seems to show an aircraft soaring before it is targeted by Ukrainian weapons.
In the clip, it can then be seen lighting up in flames as it pummels down, exploding in a fireball as it reaches the ground.
The video has been widely shared on social media. Although it is unclear how the footage was captured, some on Twitter have suggested the clip was taken by a drone.
It is not clear when or where the video was filmed but investigative journalism group Bellingcat has geolocated the footage to have taken place in Kozarovychi in the Kyiv Oblast – around 25 miles from Kyiv.
The group has been focusing on verifying footage from the conflict since it began on February 24.
The video was also shared by Kyiv Independent reporter Illia Ponomarenko, and now has more than 39,300 likes.
It appears the original video was shared by a Kyiv resident on Facebook.
A translation of the caption, in Ukrainian, seems to say the country’s forces ‘shot down a Russian combat helicopter’ as ‘aerial reconnaissance shares an operational video’.
“Glory to Ukraine,” he adds.