The Stunt Pilot Hunting Russian Drones

A Ukrainian flying ace is leveraging his aerobatics skills to protect his countrymen from nightly attacks.

By Ed Caesar
May 25, 2026


The most challenging part of an international aerobatics contest is the Free Unknown. Pilots arrive at a competition after having polished sequences of loops, stall turns, and barrel rolls. But for the Free Unknown section they learn which assortment of tricks they must perform only a day in advance. Contestants plan out how they will string together the stipulated moves in the most pleasing fashion, but they cannot rehearse the routine, except in their minds. It’s a test of imagination and airmanship that often decides the competition.

In 2019, the World Intermediate Aerobatics Championship, which was held on an airfield in the Czech town of Břeclav, contained three Free Unknowns. The winner of the first was a twenty-five-year-old Ukrainian pilot named Timur Fatkullin. At the controls of his red-and-silver Extra 330LX—a nimble German sports plane—he made the unusual move of starting his sequence upside down. He then executed a complicated routine as if he’d practiced it for months. The Ukrainian team, boosted by Fatkullin’s performance, won gold. Trevor Dugan, who served as a navigator with the R.A.F. in Afghanistan and Iraq, was on the British team, which took bronze. Fatkullin, he said, was “absolutely phenomenal.”

Not long after that championship, Fatkullin stopped entering aerobatics competitions: first came the pandemic, then the war with Russia. He moves through life impatiently. Now thirty-two, he has five children. He is tall, with a tight beard, pale-green eyes, and a square jaw. Even in casual situations, he stands ramrod straight, as though about to give or receive an order. He often wears a shirt with three buttons undone, a beige leather flying jacket with the collar turned up, combat pants, and Nike high-tops. He plays the guitar, a little piano. He often carries a thick fold of high-value bills. He speaks several languages, including English (almost perfectly) and Spanish (conversationally). He once spent thirty days in jail after breaking the ribs of a man who’d threatened his wife. (The case never reached trial.) He can dance the tango.

When Fatkullin was in his mid-twenties, he started doing stunts with a group of other extreme athletes: parachutists, motorcyclists, a free diver. They eventually named themselves Aerotim. Fatkullin began developing a travelling one-hour show that would combine various modes of daredevilry—he told me that he’d wanted it to be so exhilarating that audience members “wouldn’t have time to lick their ice cream.” Shortly after winning his gold medal in the Czech Republic, Fatkullin had an idea for a trick that could be the show’s centerpiece. He called Serhii Gusak, a Ukrainian motorcyclist, to discuss it.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/06/01/the-stunt-pilot-hunting-russian-drones

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