Russia refuses to use Ukrainian Nitka naval pilot training site

18:00 10.09.2013
Russia

Russia has officially informed the Ukrainian side that from 2014 it no longer plans to use the Nitka ground-based naval carrier-deck pilot training site in the interests of Russia Navy, a top source with Russia's Defense Ministry told RIA Novosti.

"The Ukrainian side has been informed that the Nitka ground-based naval carrier-deck pilot training site in Crimea from 2014 and later is not planned to be used for the training of pilots of the Russian Navy," the source noted. According to him, the Ukrainian partners in response declared their readiness to terminate the Ukrainian-Russian intergovernmental agreement 1997, which regulates the use of the Nitka training site.

"The construction of the Russian Nitka complex is being completed in Eysk (Krasnodar Krai). In mid-July of this year, MiG-29KUB made their first training flights, simulating the approach to the aircraft deck of the site," the reports said.

The Russian simulator in Eysk will be operational at the turn of 2013-2014.

As known, the Nitka pilot training facility was built in the Soviet era for pilots to practice taking-off and landing from aircraft carrier decks. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the facility remained under Ukraine's control.

The site provides facilities such as a launch pad, a catapult launch device and arrester wires, a glide-path localizer, a marker beacon, and an optical landing system.

Adapted from Ukrinform

 

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