A Russian military across the Dnieper River reportedly took the bullet in his chest or abdomen.

Vyacheslav Kovalskyi, a 59-year-old businessman turned sniper specialist for the military counter-intelligence unit of SBU - Ukraine’s domestic security service, has claimed the world record of reaching the farthest target ever killed from a sniper rifle.

In an exclusive interview for the Wall Street Journal, the Ukrainian serviceman said that together with his spotter, who was responsible for calculating crucial parameters such as distance and wind speed, he eliminated a Russian officer from an astonishing distance of 3,800 meters on 18 November 2023. 

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The previous record belonged to an unnamed Canadian special forces member who in 2017 took down a target in Iraq as far as 3,540 meters. 

The SBU confirmed the report and provided a video of the operation. 

Kovalskyi told the WSJ that his team positioned itself across the river from the Russian military base in the Kherson Region, remaining motionless for several hours under freezing temperatures.

Kovalskyi then identified an officer giving commands among the occupiers. After a failed test shot at 300 meters due to an inaccurate assessment of wind speed, the second shot, meticulously calculated by the spotter, took the invader down.

Kovalskyi believes that the bullet, which took nine seconds to reach the target, hit the Russian military in his chest or abdomen, making survival impossible.

While some snipers expressed skepticism about the accuracy of their Ukrainian colleague’s professional account, other snipers and ballistics experts acknowledged that the shot was theoretically possible with the equipment used by Kovalskyi, though it presented significant challenges due to uncontrollable variables.

Kovalskyi used a Volodar Obriy rifle (above), featuring a barrel manufactured by the American company Bartlein Barrels, a Japanese sight, and the rest being of Ukrainian origin. The custom-made cartridge measured about 16 cm in length.

But experience is important too. Vyacheslav Kovalskyi has successfully participated in long-distance shooting competitions in Europe and North America for decades. At one of these, he met his spotter. Now both make a team at war.

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Sniper attacks are frequent on both sides of the Russian-Ukrainian war. There are no conclusive statistics on casualties from such attacks.

Although snipers tend to remain anonymous for as long as possible, for safety reasons, the Kovalskyi case is a clear example of SBU propaganda to raise the morale of Ukrainian troops and mobilize more Western support for Kyiv amid the stalled offensive and pause of U.S. military assistance.