Direct proof of use
The documented combat-theater use of the Zubr-class LCAC in the 2014 Russia-Ukraine War centers on the opening Crimea operation. A Naval Postgraduate School thesis, citing Roger McDermott's study of Russian military power in Ukraine, states that Russian forces conducted an amphibious landing at Feodosiya with a Zubr air-cushioned landing craft on March 1, 2014.
McDermott's account describes the Zubr as depositing troops in Feodosiya and says they may have included elements of either the 184th Coastal Defense Brigade or the 382nd Naval Infantry Battalion. The sources therefore support the landing-craft use, Russian side, date, and location, but they leave the exact embarked unit uncertain.
Sources: NPS Russia Threat Thesis, McDermott Brothers Disunited
Timeline
On March 1, 2014, during the rapid Russian seizure of Crimea, a Zubr hovercraft landed troops at Feodosiya. The landing occurred as Russian forces were also moving Spetsnaz, airborne, naval infantry, and other supporting units into or across Crimea.
The Feodosiya landing belongs to the Crimea phase of the wider conflict rather than the later Donbas or full-scale-invasion phases. The available sources do not establish a later, separately documented Zubr-class combat landing in the same conflict.
Sources: NPS Russia Threat Thesis, McDermott Brothers Disunited
Operational role
In this conflict, the Zubr's supported role was high-speed amphibious troop movement during the seizure of Crimea. The craft was not documented as firing its own armament in the cited accounts; the conflict-use evidence concerns transport and insertion of Russian troops at Feodosiya.
The episode shows how Russia used Black Sea Fleet basing and amphibious lift to reinforce the Crimea operation early in the crisis. It also illustrates the limits of the public record: published military analyses identify the craft type and landing site, but describe the embarked force only as probable or possible elements of named Russian coastal-defense or naval-infantry units.
Sources: NPS Russia Threat Thesis, McDermott Brothers Disunited
