Hi, I’m sorry to breath new life into this thread, but here goes:

I read in Yefim Gordon’s “Russian Air Power” (p.62) that the Russian Air Force “by early 1992 there were around twenty-five [A-50s] in service in total, altough only about ten aircraft remain airworthy”.

Okey, judging out of this it seems that the Russians have 10 Mainstays in service (the book is from 2001, though) of the total of 26 beeing built (including prototypes).
Its logical that they kept all the 4-5 A-50U Mainstay-Bs in service, and phased out most of the Mainstay-A.

Now, my question is. Where are those 10 planes stationed to cover large parts of the country?
Are they stationed on their own bases, with other Air Defence units, or with Candid units (to ease the maintainence)?

Here is some more pics of the Mainstay.

Anyone got more of the Maxdome?

First and second is an A-50U Mainstay-B, third is an A-50 Mainstay-A beeing escorted by two Su-27UB/Su-30s, and fourth is an “Aircraft 976” Mainstay-C parked on airshow display.

Didn’t Russia sell a A-50I to China, and has now been redesigned KJ-2000 since China modified it with their own radar?