Originally built for the Iraqi Army in 1990, but not delivered. Became CCCP-29112 with MAP Rosverto and served the UN as UN-950 from Sep 1992. In Nov 1995 transferred to Rostvertol as RA-29112. Damaged while on a positioning flight to Somalia when a part of a main rotor blade came off in-flight(!) near Trabzon, Turkey on 31 Dec 1993. Repaired and entered the Vertical-T fleet in Jan 2006. Seen here with cyrillic "Вертикаль-T" (=Vertical-T) titles on the nose. Sadly this Mi-26 crashed on 2 Dec 2006 near Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan, Afghanistan.

Transiting to a rotorcraft exhibition in the US. It carries commemorative markings for 50 years Lend-Lease and 500 years Columbus finding America.

A giant on the northern platform of Kandahar. It's incredible that these huge and slow moving helicopters could survive in a high threat environment of Afghanistan. There were fighter jets are manoeuvring at low level to the max to prevent being shot by Taliban, these Mi-26s are just a sitting duck and just fly...

In the heatwaves of Kandahar, a Vertical-T Mi-8 is executing a landing at Kandahar.

A huge number of civil helicopters operated out of Kandahar airfield. Mainly Mi-8s, but also S-92, S-61, AW139, Bell 214s were seen.