A Ukrainian F-16 pilot downed nine Russian drones in a single sortie.
Olena Mukhina
November 6, 2026
Euromaidan Press
One Ukrainian F-16 pilot shot down nine Russian drones in a single sortie, using only the plane’s cannon. Days earlier, the same pilot had downed eight in one flight, a record he then broke, the 107th Separate Aviation Wing said, relaying its commander’s remarks at the International Fighter Conference in Munich.
The feat is a vivid snapshot of how Ukraine is beating Russia’s drone swarms on the cheap. Rather than spend an air-to-air missile worth far more than its target, the pilot leaned on the F-16’s 20mm gun, and he is not alone: Ukraine’s F-16s have downed about 4,700 Russian strike drones over the war, roughly 1,100 of them in October, most by cannon.
The 107th is itself part of that overhaul, the first of the NATO-style “wings” Ukraine is forming as it remakes its air force on the alliance’s model by 2035.
Eight, then nine
On the first of the two flights, the pilot destroyed eight Russian drones, firing 400 rounds from the F-16’s 20mm M61A1 Vulcan cannon and landing with 100 to spare, the wing said. Days later, he went up again and broke his own record, downing nine and returning with 80 rounds still in the belt. “The tactic is simple: just get into range and fire the cannon,” the wing’s commander said, describing how the jets work against Russian strike drones.
A cheap fix, and its cost
The gun is partly a workaround for scarcity. Ukraine’s F-16s are so short of air-to-air missiles that pilots increasingly meet drones with the cannon, saving the missiles for harder targets. But it is a blunt instrument: the 20mm rounds behave like grenades when they fall back to the ground, able to strike a wide area and kill the very civilians the jets are trying to protect.
The method also runs on a steady supply of ammunition Ukraine does not produce itself, and allies have stepped in: Denmark sent more than 50,000 cannon rounds, while Spain, Belgium, and Poland have been sending 20mm rounds of their own, with a larger package expected. It is that method, the commander told the Munich conference, that accounts for the vast majority of those kills.
Olena Mukhina is a journalist from Kyiv. Before joining Euromaidan Press, she worked as a website editor for Kyiv Post.