OSINT researcher Athene Noctua analyzed changes in the deployment of Russian military transport aviation throughout the full-scale war.
Based on satellite imagery analysis, he concluded that the Russians have been moving their military transport aircraft farther from Ukraine since the second half of 2023.
The researcher notes that the Russians have fewer than 10 old An-12s in active service, as well as 3 larger An-22s.
The majority of the transport fleet consists of more than 120 Il-76s—the main workhorse of the Aerospace Forces and the only aircraft type still in production.
For very large cargo, the Aerospace Forces also have about 10 An-124s, while another 11 of this type are owned by the company "Volga-Dnepr."
At the airfield in Tver, presumably, non-operational An-22s remain; Il-76s have been withdrawn from there.
Almost all Il-76s were withdrawn from the Pskov airfield (several of these planes were destroyed or damaged there by Ukrainian UAVs in 2023).
The Taganrog airfield has completely transformed into an attack aviation base—all transport aircraft were withdrawn from there.
At the same time, Athene Noctua notes a significant increase in transport aviation numbers at distant airfields such as Omsk and Ulan-Ude.
He also noted that after the Ukrainian "Pautina" (Spiderweb) operation, the Russians began moving their aircraft between airfields almost daily to better protect them from possible new attacks.
