1942 it had been reduced to a dozen operational machines. It scored some tactical successes and inflicted heavy losses on the 25th Tank Corps, the 1st Guards Mechanized Corps and their motorised formations approaching Morosovskaya, due in part to the Red Army advancing beyond air support and the weather improving. One pilot was able to fly nine missions without fearing Soviet fight opposition. III./StG 2 supported the defence of the 2nd Hungarian Army and the Italian 8th Army near Voronezh. The Voronezh Front reached the Oskol River when it came under attack by the group. Knight's Cross winner Siegfried Huber was killed in bad weather conditions, on his 434th combat mission representing the loss of another veteran. Dr Hermann Roer, III./StG 2 noted in his diary, "during its operations to ward off attacks against the German lines of defence, 4 staffel became almost obliterated." Eastern Front 1943: Crimea, Kuban and Kursk I./StG 2 did not return to Stalingrad. The remnants of the group were based at Samorsk, north of Kalach in the Crimea by 15 February 1943. Operating under Fliegerkorps VIII the formation fought against Soviet advances towards Dnepropetrovsk and the Dnieper River. Elements bombed the Black Sea port of Novorossisk on 27 February and it fought over the Mius and Taganrog front from Stalino, in the Donets Basin. The group also operated in the Kharkov area and around Belgorod in March 1943. In the first half of April 1943, it fought over the Kuban bridgehead, on the Taman Peninsula from Kerch. On 16 April it bombed the beachhead at Novorossisk, where Black Sea Fleet infantry had made an amphibious landing. II./StG 2 supported the same operations, but fought at the Third Battle of Kharkov. From 2 March to 27 June 1943, the group recorded the loss of 15 Ju 87s and one damaged. Nine men were posted missing, three wounded and six killed. III./StG 2 conducted wider ranging operations in 1943. The main body of the group was still at Vyazma but elements fought at Kharkov, then south along the Voronezh, Rossosh and Millerovo. Some staffeln were known to have fought at Third Kharkov. From 1 to 15 April, elements transferred from Poltava to Kerch and operate dover the Kuban bridgehead. The group prevented the advance of Soviet forces through to the Sea of Azov from 5 May. The group used incendiary bombs to burn off reeds and vegetation