Aires Hobby Models provides a variety of high quality resin products to upgrade, or correct, a variety of models in the most popular scales. They also have a line of crew and pilot figures in 1/72^nd, 1/48^th and 1/32^nd scale. These figures are relatively inexpensive, and make a nice addition to an aircraft diorama, or to add a better since of scale to a finished model.

Aerobonus’ latest offering is of a Soviet woman pilot wearing flight gear and a parachute. Women played an important role in the Soviet army during World War II, making up about 3% of the total Soviet military personnel. In addition to serving in medical and auxiliary roles, a great number of women flew as pilots, and fought as snipers, machine gunners, and in the armored forces. I don’t know of any other offerings of Soviet woman pilot figures, so this is a welcome addition recognizing an important group of individuals.

The figure is posed in a relaxed standing pose, without any headgear and wearing a flight suit with a parachute. The resin figure comes in four nicely cast pieces, with the arms, head, and body each molded separately on the pour stub. The flight suit, and parachute harness are excellently detailed. The head could use a little more work, since the face is bland without defined features around the eyes, and the hair, and in particular the bangs in front, make her hair look a little more like a helmet. Still, it is nice to have a figure to represent this important part of the Soviet military, and the proportions are perfect for 1/48th scale. Aerobonus’ painting instructions include a drawing of the figure with simple colors identified.

Assembly is quick and straight-forward, and aside from removing the extra resin between the figure’s legs, there is little to no clean-up needed. I painted my figure using Vallejo paints, and had no issues with the paint adhering to the resin.

I recommend this figure for any Soviet model builder as a nice addition to an often overlooked part of World War II.

Thanks to Aires and IPMS/USA for providing the figure for review.