Ukraine said that one of its F-16 fighter jets crashed while repelling a Russian air attack, but its pilot survived.
In an announcement on Friday, Ukraine’s air force said that preliminary data showed the pilot destroyed three aerial targets and was targeting a fourth when an issue occurred with the US-made jet.
“An emergency situation occurred on board,” it said, according to a translation by Ukrainian publication Militarnyi.
The air force did not elaborate on what the situation was or whether the Russian targets were drones, missiles, or aircraft.
But it said that the pilot safely ejected after moving away from a populated area, and was quickly found and evacuated by a rescue team.
It described the pilot as safe and stable.
The air force said the incident occurred at around 3:30 a.m. local time on Friday and that a special commission was investigating what happened.
Ukraine has lost at least two F-16s before this incident, including one that crashed last year while battling Russian missiles.
Ukraine’s F-16s, a fighter jet originally produced by General Dynamics and now manufactured by Lockheed Martin, have been used to defend cities and stop Russian attacks.
But while that role has been important, many air warfare experts describe it as one that Ukraine has been pushed toward because it doesn’t have enough of the jets to use in other roles.
Ukraine started requesting F-16s soon after Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, but the first ones didn’t arrive until the summer of 2024.
Some allied countries wanted to send them sooner, but required permission to supply the US-made jets, which the US was initially reluctant to give.