On January 5, 1973, the first ever parachuting of an amphibious assault vehicle with a crew inside was carried out in the USSR.

The idea of ​​this experiment belonged to the Hero of the Soviet Union, General of the Army Vasily Margelov, who commanded the Airborne Forces of the USSR.

By that time, the Airborne Forces, in addition to personnel, had the opportunity to parachute engineering equipment, armored vehicles and artillery, but without a crew inside.

Because of this, after landing, the military sometimes took a lot of time to find their car.

The proposed descent of armored vehicles with a crew inside by Margelov was supposed to significantly reduce the time for entering units into battle.

Vasily Margelov planned to personally participate in the first such landing, but the military leadership of the country did not allow the legendary military leader, who was already 64 years old at that time, to take such a risk.

As a result, Lieutenant Colonel Leonid Zuev was appointed commander and driver of the first crew, and Senior Lieutenant Alexander Margelov, the son of Vasily Margelov, became the gunner.

Before the throw, they were trained on a special simulator.

  • Joint exercises of the troops of the countries participating in the Warsaw Pact.

    Landing of military equipment

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  • © Alexander Sergeev

They landed in the BMD-1 (airborne combat vehicle), which entered service with the Airborne Forces in 1969.

The car was distinguished by low weight, high speed characteristics and could overcome water obstacles.

The BMD-1 was equipped with a 73 mm 2A28 cannon and a 7.62 mm PKT machine gun paired with it.

The small combat weight of the BMD-1 (7.5 tons) was achieved due to the first use of aluminum armor in the practice of Soviet engineering.

However, such armor protected the crew only from small arms fire of 7.62 mm caliber and shell fragments.

The first landing of the BMD-1 with the crew inside was carried out on a special platform using the Centaur parachute system, which, before being thrown with people, went through a test program, including with the participation of animals.

Inside the BMD-1, the paratroopers were located on modernized space chairs of the Kazbek-D type.

The descent was carried out from the An-12 military transport aircraft, which is capable of taking on board up to two BMD-1s.

The experiment was decided to be carried out at the training ground of the 106th Guards Airborne Division Slobodka, located near Tula.

Zuev and Margelov were given the task of making a successful throw, mooring the car after landing and starting to move within two minutes.

The crew members thus had to demonstrate that they not only endured all the stages of the landing, but can also successfully conduct combat operations after that. 

Alexander Margelov spoke about his impressions of that flight in the book “Paratrooper No. 1 Army General Margelov” written by him and his brother Vitaly Margelov.

  • Airborne combat vehicle (BMD-1) during the celebration of the Day of the Airborne Forces of the Russian Federation at the training ground of the 242nd training center of the Airborne Forces

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  • © Alexey Malgavko

“The machine smoothly rolled over the edge of the cargo hatch - to the ground 800 m. Like a giant pendulum with a swing center around the pilot chute, our “iron” first collapsed 135 ° from the horizontal, then began to swing with a gradually decreasing amplitude.

The drogue parachutes opened, and then the main parachutes.

Turning over at the first moment upside down, we experienced a state close to weightlessness for several seconds.

Trash from nowhere rose into the air," Alexander Margelov recalled.

After landing, the crew fired blanks on the move.

The tests were considered successful.

After that, Vasily Margelov ordered to repeat the experiment in all airborne divisions.

All subsequent throws were also successful.

As noted on the website of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, "the new tactics made it possible to ensure the introduction of airborne divisions into battle not within a day, as it was before, but within hours and minutes."

“Western countries, including the United States, France and England, having learned about our experiments, organized work in this direction, but so far no one in the world has been conducting such tests,” the military department stated.

"Jet" Centaur "

After the successful landing of the BMD-1 with Zuev and Margelov, the Airborne Forces moved on to the next stage of testing.

Now the military had to try out a new parachute system - the "Jet" Centaur "(" Reaktaur ").

Compared to the conventional Centaur, it had a number of important advantages.

So, in the "Reaktaur" there was no platform, and instead of several parachutes, one, more economical and light, was used.

In addition, unlike the Centaur, which was attached to the BMD-1 at the airfield before departure, the Reaktavr was mounted and transported directly on an armored vehicle.

  • Armed forces of the USSR.

    Landing of military equipment from the Il-76 military transport aircraft during military exercises

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  • © Lev Polikashin

An important advantage of the Reaktaur was also the fact that it descended from the plane at a speed of up to 25 m / s - four times faster than the Centaur.

At the time of landing, the rate of descent was extinguished to zero due to the thrust of the jet engines of the parachute system.

The first test jump took place on January 23, 1976 at the parachute track of the 76th Guards Airborne Division.

The responsible and dangerous task was again entrusted to Alexander Margelov, who by that time was already a major.

He led the crew, and Lieutenant Colonel Leonid Shcherbakov became the driver.

The tests were successful, after which the Reaktavr was put into service.

In 1996, Alexander Margelov and Leonid Shcherbakov were awarded the title of Hero of the Russian Federation for their courage and heroism.

Meanwhile, the USSR continued to improve equipment for the transfer and landing of airborne units.

In particular, a new Il-76 military transport aircraft was adopted, which could already take on board three BMD-1s.

Airborne combat vehicles also developed.

On the basis of the BMD-1, the BMD-2 was created, which was put into service in 1985.

Then came BMD-3 and BMD-4.

Currently, the Airborne Forces are receiving the latest airborne combat vehicles BMD-4M and multi-purpose armored personnel carriers BTR-MDM "Rakushka".

As noted on the website of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, “parachute-strapdown systems PBS-950U and PBS-955 with the possibility of landing personnel stationed inside armored vehicles” were created for them.

"Colossal advantage"

As military expert Vladislav Shurygin notes, the need for landing personnel in a combat vehicle stemmed from the Soviet concept of using the airborne forces.

“In our country and in the West, airborne units are used in different ways.

In NATO, these are auxiliary airmobile units.

They do not drop regiments at once.

The task of Western paratroopers is to clear the way for the landing of aircraft from which equipment and people are already being landed.

We also used the concept of "from the sky - into battle."

We immediately envisaged the possibility of landing people, vehicles, and weapons.

The entire regiment landed and entered into hostilities.

Therefore, the development of armored vehicles for landing with a crew was carried out precisely in the USSR, ”Shurygin said in an interview with RT.

According to him, landing in technology allowed the Soviet airborne troops to significantly increase their efficiency.

“In the concept of a big war, the landing troops were assigned the role of assault units, which were supposed to capture and hold objects until the main forces approached.

Time played a key role in this.

The equipment that the Airborne Forces used was previously thrown out by parachute without landing.

In strong winds, soldiers and vehicles could land at a great distance from each other.

Landing with equipment made it possible to immediately engage in battle, ”says Shurygin.

A similar opinion is shared by military expert Yuri Knutov.

“If you land equipment and personnel separately, this will significantly complicate the search and bringing vehicles to combat readiness.

Lost time and suddenness of impact.

This problem was just solved by our paratroopers.

A huge advantage has appeared, ”Knutov emphasized in an interview with RT.

According to him, the experience acquired by Soviet paratroopers in the 1970s is still used in the Russian Airborne Forces.

“The developments that we received half a century ago are still used by our paratroopers.

At the same time, almost no one does such operations.

Only Russian landing troops, ”concluded Knutov.