He chose the Ukrainian sky. In memory of pilot Serhii Prokazin, who died with Juice

On his 18th birthday, a first-year student of the Kharkiv Military Aviation Institute Serhii Prokazin scraped his pockets with enough coupon karbovanets to buy a briquette of jelly. He and his friend Andrii crunched that jelly and dreamed of their future life as military pilots.

In these dreams, there was no black day on August 25, 2023, when Major Prokazin, navigator of the 40th Air Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, along with Juice and Viacheslav Minka, would crash near Zhytomyr, and Andrii would call his wife and say: “Serhii is gone”.

Only to fly

Serhii's father, a fighter pilot, saw his three sons only as pilots, so he was very concerned about their physical training. He even dipped them in a winter river: he would take them out of the water, rub them dry, and then let them run cross-country to keep them warm. There are family photos of his sons, still babies, trying to pull themselves up on the horizontal bar.

Serhii's childhood friend and fellow soldier Andrii, who was called the fourth son in the Prokazin family, recounts: “They had a sports corner in their children's room: barbells, dumbbells, gymnastic rings. We did push-ups, sit-ups, and press-ups. Uncle Lonia held competitions between us and even came up with awards for the winners. And in the 9th grade, Serhii and I were already in a section where schoolchildren were taught to skydive.”

Then there was the pilot institute, service in air regiments in Mykolaiv and Myrhorod.

“In 2004, my son was discharged from the army,” says Leonid Illich. “It was terrible: the military pilot was forced to work as a security guard, delivering some goods, helping me in the fruit and berry nursery instead of flying. My son was very worried, he only wanted to be a pilot. He did not even agree to stay in the army in a non-flying position.”

Only in 2010 did Serhii manage to return to the Armed Forces. According to the information provided to hromadske by the press service of the 40th Tactical Aviation Brigade, Prokazin became a combat training officer at the Center Air Command, served as the commander of the aviation unit of the 831st Tactical Aviation Brigade, and held the position of chief of staff - first deputy commander of the aviation squadron.

“Serhii did not participate in the ATO. But he helped military pilots restore their combat capability to participate in the ATO, trained them to work on targets,” says Maksym H., Prokazin's colleague in Myrhorod.

In 2021, Serhii became a navigator in the 40th Air Brigade.

“He and I served together for about two years, and I am also a navigator. Serhii was able to find an unconventional solution to any non-standard problem. And at the same time, he was easy to talk to, sociable, and without unnecessary ambition,” says Prokazin's friend, who asked not to be named or ranked.

At the time of his death, Serhii, a 3rd class pilot, had almost 400 hours of flight time.

“Major Prokazin did not take direct part in combat operations, as he did not have time to regain the flight skills necessary to fly a MIG-29,” says Colonel Oleksii Maniushkin, commander of the 40th Brigade. “He performed special combat missions: he conducted aerial reconnaissance, diverted the enemy's attention from the main group of our aircraft, and relayed commands from the combat control officer. He was a conscientious officer who believed that there were no problems that could not be solved.”

Brother against brother

In the early 90s, many ethnic Russians in the military tried to leave for Russia. Serhii's father, who served as a fighter pilot in Myrhorod, retired and went there as well. But due to problems with housing, he soon returned to Myrhorod. Serhii's mother and his two brothers also went to Russia after divorcing her husband.

Meanwhile, Serhii, born in Uzbekistan to Russian parents, took a military oath of allegiance to the people of Ukraine.

“He didn’t even think of moving to Russia after graduating from the military institute,” says Andrii. “Serhii had been in sixth grade when his family moved to Ukraine, and his homeland was already here. He even tried to speak Ukrainian, but he sounded funny.”

Serhii had a strong emotional bond with his brothers and mother. Until 2014, when it turned out that the people closest to him believed in the propaganda about the crucified boy and the Ukrainian Nazis.

“I have respected Lyudmila Georgievna since childhood. She is a teacher of Russian language and literature, and she never raised her voice, even the word ‘fool’ was unacceptable to her. But when she came to Myrhorod in 2016 to see her grandson, Denys, she was afraid to go out for several days because she thought she would be torn apart for speaking Russian,” Andrii recalls.

According to him, Serhii tried to explain to his mother and brothers how they were wrong, but it was all in vain. After February 24, 2022, his mother and brothers became outspoken Putinists.

“It seems to me that Serhii was even embarrassed that his relatives in Russia were so zombie-like. It hurt him a lot,” says Maksym H.

At the beginning of the great war, Serhii received an angry message from his brother, a military pilot in Russia. He wrote that he had been suspended from duty because of Serhii.

“Serhii answered him: ‘Do you see the difference between our countries? Mine trusts me, and yours does not,’” says Andrii.

hromadske called Ms. Lyudmyla in St. Petersburg and asked her what she thought about the death of her son, a Ukrainian defender.

“I am proud of him. He remained true to his oath, to his land. I'm sorry, I can't talk anymore,” the woman replied.

And later she wrote: “I cannot imagine that he is gone. Because Serhii is life itself: bright and light. In love with the sky. He will always be like that for me. It's hard that he won't be able to raise the son he's been dreaming of for a long time. Everything that happened is too painful.”

Father of two sons

Serhii went to school with Halyna in Myrhorod, but he didn't pay much attention to the girl, who was a year younger. Halyna, the daughter of a military pilot, also became a military. It was during her service that she renewed her school acquaintance with Serhii. At the time, he had a relationship in his past, and she was divorced.

“I was used to living alone with my son, and when Serhii appeared, I was surprised that he was helping me solve some problems,” says Halyna. “For a long time, I did not dare to marry him. That was not the age for dating, and I thought, ‘What's the use of this marriage?’ But I asked my son: ‘Shall we move to Uncle Serhii's?’ And he said: ‘Of course!’ We are both military people and come from military families, so we have a family where everyone understands what service is, where people share common interests and don't have to explain anything.”

The man was rarely at home – he was always on business trips. But when he was home, he would delight his wife and friends with his own brewed beer and gin, could even bake a cake, and cook meat dishes. He was always dreaming of going somewhere abroad, where everything was “all-inclusive”. He loved gatherings in the gazebo, around which he planted berry bushes, and conversations with his friends while having barbecues.

According to Maksym, Prokazin's colleague in Myrhorod, Serhii was able to discuss arguments in a reasoned and calm manner and never broke down into quarrels.

“You go to his house, and his sincere smile greets you. He was very pleasant to talk to, and I always wanted to hug him, not just to shake his hand, but to hug him – he was such a sincere person,” says Maksym.

Serhii had no children of his own at the time, so he became attached to Ihor.

“I was about 11 or 12 when Serhii appeared. He started talking to me, and we always had something to do: he helped me with my homework, took me to the airfield, and taught me how to drive,” says Ihor.

It was obvious that he would also become a military pilot. He wanted to study in Kharkiv, just like Serhii.

“After entering the school, my father and I had a perfect relationship. We were already talking like two pilots, like serious men about serious matters. It was cool.”

In 2015, Serhii and Halyna's son Denys was born. Ihor dreamed of “having a little boy, like all his classmates,” so he was eager to change the boy's diapers.

“Serhii used to say that Denys was an extension of him. He used to bring some games and construction sets for him from every business trip, and played with him as a friend,” Maksym says.

Now 8-year-old Denys is laying out a game he made for his father: “It's simple: you have to roll the dice and make moves with the chips. If you land on a candy icon, you eat candy, if you land on a painted car, you get a license.”

When Serhii moved from Myrhorod to Vasylkiv, he brought his favorite book with him, The Count of Monte Cristo. He knew it almost by heart, and still read it constantly. Cardinal Spada's treasure stirred his imagination so much that he fascinated Denys as well.

“My godfather gave me foreign coins, so my dad and I put them in a jar and buried them behind the kindergarten. We also put a note in it so that whoever finds the treasure in 200 years will know about us. But my friends, Vania and Zhenia, deliberately dug up the treasure, returned the money to us, and took the jar for themselves. So we didn't bury it again,” Denys says.

His father began to accustom him to high speeds as well – he raced with his son on a go-kart, like on an airplane, only helmets flashed…

The day everything stopped

This summer, 21-year-old Ihor became a military pilot. In August, the young lieutenant arrived to serve in an air unit near Zhytomyr, where his father was on a business trip.

On August 27, the family was to celebrate Serhii and Halyna's ninth wedding anniversary in Vasylkiv. Serhii and Ihor were planning to come home on August 26, the date Halyna had made her husband's hairdresser and dentist appointments. This was the subject of their last conversation.

According to Ihor, he knew that his father was scheduled to fly on August 25. He started calling him when the flight was supposed to end. But no one answered. Then Ihor called the management.

“It's a shame to hear about the death by phone. I wasn't allowed to go near Snihuri (the place where the plane crash happened – ed.), and I didn't see the body. I didn't know how to tell my mom; I was afraid to call her. I was very nervous, I was crying. The guys told me something, but those words did not help,” says Ihor.

It was a relief when Serhii's colleague Maksym, who had organized the funeral, told Ihor to pack his father's belongings and bring them home to Vasylkiv. Then a clear algorithm of actions emerged.

When Halyna was sorting through those things after the funeral, she found a gift Serhii had prepared for her for their wedding anniversary – gold jewelry. But she was never able to wear them.

“Even though Serhii and I served in different brigades, the specifics of my military position meant that within ten minutes of his death, I knew about the trouble,” says Andriш, a childhood friend. “I rushed to check the information through my channels, and the information was confirmed. I then told the command: As a friend of Serhii and Halia, I should be the one to inform her and Leonid Illich about his death, because I know how to talk to them. When I called, Halia thought I was playing a joke and even told me to go to hell. His father did not immediately understand what I was talking about. It was painful. It still hurts now. Serhii and I were like brothers.”

Serhii Prokazin, who was posthumously promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel, was buried in the columbarium of the Baikove Cemetery in Kyiv.

“That coffin that everyone in the brigade was saying goodbye to has nothing to do with Serhii. I think he is on a business trip. That he will land right now and send me a message with a bee, as usual. And I will traditionally respond with a kiss,” says Halyna.

Ihor will spend a few more days on vacation with his mother and then go to work. He says that after Serhii's death, he is not afraid to get into the cockpit. But with whom will he discuss his military life now? Who will he be proud to show off his first combat flight to?