claim of Lt. G.A. Baevskiy 5 GIAP 12Dec43
 

I'm sure a lot of people have read the rescue of Lt Georgiy Arturovich Baevskiy (WIA) 5 GIAP (11 GIAD) who's La-5 was shot down and Lt. Petr Terent'evich Kal'sin who landed and rescued him in the snow (www.allaces.ru in the CCCP episode for the 12Dec43). It doesn't say how he was shot down and if it was a fighter why didn't they get Kal'sin when he landed. I looked through JFV 12/II and there is nothing for the area of Nikopol, Ukraine to match it. On checking Mikhail Bykov's book on Soviet aces it turns out that Baevskiy was in the area SE of Dolgintsevo shooting down a Fw 189 his 17th personal victory. I "suspect" that he got to close to his victim. Were there any Fw 189 shot down or damaged in that area on the 12Dec43?

Re: claim of Lt. G.A. Baevskiy 5 GIAP 12Dec43
 

It is also possible that his aircraft was damaged in a dog fight, though he was not shot down at once but had to make a forced landing on the way home

Re: claim of Lt. G.A. Baevskiy 5 GIAP 12Dec43
 

Yes, that is possible but a smoking aircraft is a tempting target as it also puts the wingman in danger defending him. The thing that I was looking at was the distance between Dolgintsevo and Nikopol between the either first or possible second dogfight. I would also like to know if the Fw 189 went down or escaped damaged from this encounter. Baevskiy didn't return to scoring in combat again until 28Feb45 on claiming two Fw 190 at Nimitz and Egel. The unfortunate Kil'sin would only survive until the 20Dec43 before going MIA. His final score was 15 personal.