fighter plane, 1944. In November 1942 Skomorokhov arrived at the warfront as a junior pilot in the 164th Fighter Aviation Regiment. He barely survived one of his first sorties after he got cut off from the rest of his squadron and was chased by multiple Messerschmitts; only his skillful maneuvering saved him and his fighter from the
Luftwaffe. On 2 January 1943 he scored his first aerial victory, a shared kill of an
Fw 190. It was not until 22 February 1943 that he scored his first solo victory when he shot down a
Ju 87 dive bomber. He scored one more aerial victory while flying the
LaGG-33 in March before he switched to flying the
La-5. His first victory on the La-5 in June after he shot down an
Me-109. That victory was recreated in a Soviet propaganda film, which showed him taking off from the airfield and shooting down the enemy plane right after a meeting about his application to join the Communist Party. Throughout the summer of 1943 he rapidly grew his victory tally, and by the end of the year he had claimed 13 solo shootdowns of enemy aircraft. When he switched to flying the La-5 in Spring 1945, he managed to gain nine aerial victories over the course of one month. In 1944 Skomorokhov was selected as the deputy commander of a free-hunting "squadron of aces" formed out of the best pilots of the 295th Fighter Aviation Division. His colleagues there included flying aces and , who were also awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union. While the squadron did shoot down dozens of enemy aircraft, it was disbanded after three months of existence since regimental commanders in the 295th Fighter Aviation Division wanted their aces back and the regiments they left suffered higher casualty rates in their absence. After the squadron was disbanded, he was assigned in April as the deputy squadron commander of the 1st squadron of the 31st Fighter Aviation Regiment, which had worked closely with the "squadron of aces" when it existed and shared an airbase with them; he was eventually promoted to the position of squadron commander. Over Czechoslovakia near
Székesfehérvár in December 1944, Skomorokhov shot down four enemy aircraft in one day after he led an attack on a group of eight Fw 190 and two Me-109 in one mission and then attacked another group of eight Fw 190 in another mission. During the first engagement, his wingman was shot down by an Me-109, but on the second mission, his wingman shot down an Fw 190. On 28 December he was nominated for the title Hero of the Soviet Union, which he received on 23 February 1945. After gaining more aerial victories he was nominated for a second gold star on 27 February 1945, which was awarded after the war on 18 August 1945. Throughout the course of the war he fought in the
5th and
17th Air Armies on the
Transcaucasian,
North Caucasian,
Southwestern and
3rd Ukrainian fronts, and participated in military operations over Caucasus, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Austria. In total, he scored 44 solo and three shared confirmed aerial victories, having made 605 sorties and engaged in 143 dogfights. Despite the odds being against him, he was never shot down or wounded. == Postwar ==