Overview

• On June 29, Russia launched 537 aerial weapons—including 477 drones and decoys and 60 missiles—in the heaviest strike since February 2022.
• Ukraine’s integrated air defenses shot down 249 incoming threats and electronically jammed 226 others, with F-16 fighters playing a key interception role.
• Lt. Col. Maksym Ustymenko, flying one of Ukraine’s Western-supplied F-16s, was killed after downing seven targets and steering his damaged jet away from populated areas.
• Strikes struck Kherson, Kharkiv, Cherkasy and Lviv regions, killing at least two civilians and wounding others, including a child in Cherkasy.
• Poland and NATO allies scrambled jets to secure airspace as direct peace talks in Istanbul yielded no breakthrough.