Few days ago, Al-Arabia has published a video report about the 'Jaish Al-Islam' captured L-39 aircraft in Kshesh AFB as can be seen HERE.
This video looks the same one recorded by the team who edited the first promo of Jaish Al-Ismal operations published on Nov. 2013.
The colors and pattern of the camo are totally new, especially with the black accents to the fin and nose.
The videos show two L-39 operational could successfully start their engines and taxi. Whether they took off or not, if Jaish Al-Islam could bring another L-39 operational...all these are still unknown as the AFB is tightly secured.
Jaish Al-Islam relied on the defected pilots and technicians to fix the intact aircrafts which service is not as complicated as other MiG/Su jets.
This L-39 is carrying its original serial 2111 as we could see in one of the stills which showed the aircraft in its SyAAF camo.
As stated above, the two airframes could successfully taxi on tarmac but never seen flying.
The second intact L-39 could be brought into service is this one with serial 2141 (this shot was taken before it wore its new camo).
Another unit technicians were working on is this Albatros with serial 2074.
More details can be found in Oryx's wonderful post HERE.
I'm pretty sure Kshesh was captured by the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham.
ReplyDeleteWorse than that Oryx, it is reported that the airbase is under control of a bunch of ISIS' terrorists whom are directed by two of their extremists...I read the names in a Facebook post but failed to find it again...
ReplyDeleteI've seen some photos showing their fighters posing with L-39s. I guess all are write-offs by know.
DeleteI´m intrested, how the Syrian Air force assigned registration numbers to their L-39´s? They are definitely not from their serial numbers....do you have any knowledge about this?
ReplyDelete