In the temporarily occupied Crimea, pilot Vladimir Toponar died at the age of 65. In July 2002, he was the pilot of the Su-27UB fighter, which caused one of the biggest tragedies in the history of air shows – Sknilovskaya.
The pilot died on January 21 in the occupied Crimean peninsula. There he was cremated, and the ashes were buried in Feodosia. Read more about what Vladimir Toponar remembers and about the accusation of participating in Russian bombing of Ukraine. the times of the USSR and after its collapse, Vladimir Toponar built a brilliant career as a pilot and in 1995 got into the formed elite aerobatic team “Ukrainian Falcons”, which demonstrated their skills at air shows in different countries of the world.
On July 27, 2002, it was this group that was assigned to hold an air show in Lviv on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the formation of the 14th Aviation Corps of the Ukrainian Air Force. Around noon, Vladimir Toponar, at the controls of a Su-27UB fighter, performed a complex “oblique loop with a turn” maneuver at a fairly low altitude. However, suddenly the plane began to rapidly descend, leaned on its side, hit a tree and the runway with its wing and fell right on the audience. Already on the ground, he crashed into other aircraft in the parking lot and exploded.
Vladimir Toponar and co-pilot Yuri Yegorov ejected. They managed to survive. However, the tragedy claimed the lives of people who came to watch the show. As a result of the tragedy, 77 people died, of which 28 were children. Hundreds more were injured. This is the biggest tragedy in the history of aviation shows.
More about the Sknylov tragedy: watch the video
Main culprit or scapegoat?
After the tragedy, 4 people ended up behind bars, including both pilots. Vladimir Toponar receive the most punishment – 14 years in prison. He spent 8 years in prison and was released in 2013 – the term was replaced by forced labor.
During the investigation and after leaving prison, Toponar did not admit his guilt in the tragedy. According to him, he noticed a malfunction of the aircraft, informed the command, but he was ordered to continue the show, which ended in tragedy.
Relatives of those killed in the tragedy accused the pilot of wanting to throw off the blame and noticed that he never apologized to them for the events of 2002. The pilot, however, considered himself a scapegoat and convinced that “the truth is no longer needed by anyone.”
Accusations of the bombing of Ukraine
Days before a full-scale Russian invasion in 2022, Vladimir Toponar, who lived in the Kyiv region after his release from prison, left for Crimea. The former head of the prison system of Ukraine, and now a lawyer, Serhiy Starenky, said that the pilot was taken to the temporarily occupied island by an ambulance. Upon arrival in the Crimea, Toponar allegedly joined the enemy aviation and participated in the bombing of Ukraine.
Another common version was that Toponar could allegedly be recruited into the ranks of the Wagner PPK. However, the SBU and the Office of the Prosecutor General do not have any evidence confirming at least one of the versions.
Ivan Toponar, a military pilot and the only son of Vladimir Toponar, denied all accusations against his father, but confirmed that in February 2022 he went to the Crimea for treatment with his second wife. The pilot was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. According to the son, his father was seriously ill and was bedridden in recent months. Father and son communicated from time to time, but they did not discuss the war, given that Vladimir Toponar was in the Crimea. However, until his death, Vladimir Toponar did not admit his guilt in the Sknilov tragedy.
At the same time, Ivan Toponar said that he would not sue for spreading false information about his father's participation in the war on the side of Russia.
