Women display tank skills on Tank Driver's Day. Photo: mil.ru

With female touch, tank drivers show off finesse near border to Norway

These representatives of the Northern Fleet’s motorized infantry brigade know how to chop a melon with a tank gun.

Atle Staalesen

10 September 2018 - 02:00

p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 16.0px; font: 12.0px Times; color: #000000; -webkit-text-stroke: #000000; background-color: #ffffff}p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 16.0px; font: 12.0px Times; color: #000000; -webkit-text-stroke: #000000; background-color: #ffffff; min-height: 14.0px}p.p3 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 16.0px; font: 12.0px Times; color: #000000; -webkit-text-stroke: #000000}p.p4 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 20.0px; font: 12.0px Times; color: #292929; -webkit-text-stroke: #292929; background-color: #ffffff}p.p5 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; line-height: 20.0px; font: 12.0px Times; color: #292929; -webkit-text-stroke: #292929; background-color: #ffffff; min-height: 14.0px}span.s1 {font-kerning: none}span.s2 {font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff}span.s3 {font: 14.0px Arial; text-decoration: underline ; font-kerning: none; background-color: transparent}

It was party time in Korzunovo, the military settlement in the Pechenga district, as servicemen- and women this Sunday assembled on the local tank training range to mark the national Tankdriver’s Day.

The annual celebration devoted to Russia’s operators of armored tanks took place all over the country. However, in Korzunovo, only few kilometers from Norway, this year’s festivity had a special touch.

First, two crews of tank operators demonstrated artillery shooting on targets and executed acrobatic springboard jumps with modernized heavy vehicles type T-80. Then, the turn came to a group of female operators, mil.rureports.

The women, who had undergone a one-month training course, made an extraordinary display of professional handling of the combat vehicles, the press service of the Northern Fleet informs. The young and fresh new tank drivers first showed how they managed to move a matchbox with the tank gun. They afterwards hammered a nail into a piece of timber with the same gun barrel and then chopped a melon in two parts.

See more of the amazing photos of the actions published in the regional nrewspaper Murmanski Vestnik.

The women were rewarded with bouquets of flowers.

Korzunovo is the name of the town serving Luostari air force base. Until about the year 2000, the base with the military airport code XLML was home to fighter jets and bombers. From here, Norway is 16 kilometers away, or less than a two minute flight after take-off. Nowhere did the Soviet Union have warplanes ready for missions closer to NATO than up here in the north.

Korzunovo is located near the military garrisons of Lower Luostari, Upper Luostari and 19 km where Russia’s 200th Motorized Rifle Brigade is based. It has a population of about 250.