Battle of Yavin The Battle of Yavin , also known as the Battle of the Death Star , was a major battle of the Galactic Civil War that led to the destruction of the first Death Star . It was a crippling blow to the Empire and one of the Rebellion ' s first major victories . Prelude . During the Battle of Scarif , Jyn Erso managed to steal detailed plans and design specifications for the Imperial battle station known as the Death Star and transmit them to the Rebel Alliance fleet above ; these plans soon made their way to Prince ss Leia . Imperial forces under the command of Darth Vader soon captured Princess Leia and the crew of the " Tantive IV " . Princess Leia was taken prisoner aboard the Death Star by Darth Vader . The Princess was rescued from captivity by an unlikely alliance of the smuggler Han Solo , Jedi Master Obi - Wan Kenobi , a young farmboy from Tatooine named Luke Skywalker and a Wookiee named Chewbacca . The group , in possession of the Death Star plans , fled to the Rebel base on Yavin 4 — closely pursued by the battle station . Before Organa arrived , Senator Mothma was evacuated aboard a shuttle , as General Dodonna considered her the core of the rebellion . During her time away , she composed a contingency plan : surrender to Emperor Palpatine . The battle . An analysis of the plans identified a weakness in the battle station , placed there by unwilling engineer Galen Erso : a small thermal exhaust port leading to the main reactor which would allow access to a point that could cause a chain reaction that would destroy the battle station . General Jan Dodonna briefed Rebel pilots on the plan . The Death Star ' s defenses were designed for a direct , large - scale assault . By using small , one - man fighters , the Rebels would slip through the Death Star ' s main defenses , maneuver down a narrow trench leading to the exhaust port , and insert proton torpedoes through the exhaust port . With the Death Star approaching , Y - wings from Gold Squadron and X - wings from Red Squadron and Green Squadron were dispatched to carry out the attack plan . A total of 30 ships were deployed in the assault on the Death Star : 8 Y - wings making up Gold Squadron and 22 X - wings , some making up Red Squadron and the rest making up Green Squadron . The Starfighters weaved through the turret emplacements destroying many as they passed . Red Six Jek Tono Porkins was the first to be destroyed in the volley of turret fire . The deployment of Imperial TIE fighters , including Lieutenant Iden Versio , devastated the Rebel attackers , destroying them far faster and more efficiently than the station ' s weapon emplacements had been able to . Red Four John D . Branon was the first to be shot down by the incoming TIEs During the battle , Rebels in the temple , including pilots who were left behind watched the battle from the command center , along with Fighter Boss Nera Kase . She tallied the Rebel starfighter losses as they occurred during the battle . Some time into the battle , Imperial officer Jude Edivon aboard the Death Star identified the threat of the Rebels ' attack strategy , and attempted to warn her superiors of the danger . However , Grand Moff Tarkin ignored the warning and refused to evacuate . Meanwhile , Darth Vader himself decided to lead a squadron of TIE fighters to destroy the remaining Rebel fighters . The first attack run was performed by a trio of Y - wings from Gold Squadron . The three Y - Wings , led by Gold Leader Jon Vander with Gold Two Dex Tiree and Gold Five Davish Krail escorting , attempted to make a shot on the exhaust port but were shot down by Darth Vader . A second trench run was performed by a trio of X - wings from Red Squadron flown by Red Leader Garven Dreis , Red Ten Theron Nett and Red Twelve Puck Naeco . Darth Vader picked off Theron and Puck but Dreis was able to fire off a shot at the exhaust port . However his proton torpedoes missed their mark , only scratching the surface . Before being shot down by Darth Vader , Dreis ordered another attack run . Following the final command of Red Leader , Red Five Luke Skywalker led the final attempt with Red Two Wedge Antilles and Red Three , Luke ' s old friend Biggs Darklighter , as wingmen . Rushing down the trench at full throttle , they found themselves being tailed by Darth Vader and his fighters . Vader personally damaged Antilles ' fighter , forcing him to disengage , and destroyed Darklighter ' s X - wing , forcing Skywalker to attempt the shot on his own . However in this dire moment , Rebel Command was concerned when the young pilot senselessly deactivated his targeting system for the attempt , but Skywalker assured them that nothing was wrong ; he was advised by the spirit of Kenobi to rely on the Force instead for his attack . For his part , Vader sensed this power himself and found firing on the fighter unusually difficult , with one attack only putting the fighter ' s astromech droid out of commission . When Vader prepared to finally shoot down the enemy , one of his wingmen was suddenly shot down from above beside him . The source of that attack turned out to be the " Millennium Falcon " diving out of the nearby star ' s light ; Han Solo and Chewbacca , believed to have abandoned the Rebels prior to the assault , unexpectedly returned to assist Skywalker in his most desperate moment . Momentarily distracted by the intervention , Vader ' s remaining wingman attempted to protect Vader but collided with his ship , both spiraling himself into the side of the trench and knocking Vader away from the Death Star , allowing Skywalker to fire his shot . With the aid of the Force , the torpedoes shot along the trench and entered the shaft perfectly , as the two surviving X - Wings , the lone surviving Y - Wing and the aging freighter made for Yavin 4 . The surviving rebel pilots included Skywalker , Antilles and Gold Three Evaan Verlaine . On the Overbridge , unaware of his impending doom , Tarkin continued to examine the battle as the technicians counted down the moments until firing commenced . Mere seconds before the superlaser could obliterate the moon , the torpedoes struck the reactor and the mammoth station exploded into a million pieces , killing all aboard instantly and saving Yavin 4 . Aftermath . Skywalker , Solo , and the surviving Rebel fighters returned to Yavin , where they held a celebration ceremony and awarded the pair with medals for their achievement in saving the Rebellion . Senator Mothma , having heard of the victory , permanently discarded her contingency plan . Darth Vader , one of the few Imperial survivors of the battle , was recovered in his damaged TIE Advanced x1 by Imperial pilots Ciena Ree and Berisse Sai . Iden Versio , who was outside of the Death Star ' s explosion , managed to pilot her damaged TIE Fighter to Yavin IV , where she ejected before it crashed into the jungle . There , she patched her wounds and stole a transport from the Rebel Base during the festivities . Nearly all blame on the defeat was placed on Tarkin and his overconfidence . He had assumed that the station would not need an escort , and had launched no TIEs , other than the single squad Vader had launched . No matter what though Tarkin was no longer alive to defend himself and the Empire would never engage the rebels without exploiting their larger numbers again . Thane Kyrell and the other Imperials stationed at the abandoned Rebel base on Dantooine during the battle were cut off from communication with Coruscant after the Death Star was destroyed . Unconfirmed rumors spread through the ranks that the new weapon was gone . Early on , these rumors were dismissed as an Imperial trap to lure the Rebels out of hiding . The destruction of the Death Star caused chaos within the Imperial ranks , leading to deliberate oversights on internal investigations and the rapid promotion of many young officers and lieutenants such as Ciena Ree to replace the higher - ranked officers killed on the Death Star . Shortly after the battle , the Rebels were forced to leave the site of their victory , fleeing the Empire once again . To capitalize on the Empire ' s weakness following the destruction of the Death Star , the Rebels began to conduct dozens of raids against Imperial targets to weaken the now - vulnerable Empire . In addition to attacks carried out on the shipyard s of Kuat and a supply base on Imdaar , a Rebel team composed of Leia Organa , Han Solo and Luke Skywalker assaulted and destroyed the Empire ' s largest armament factory on Cymoon 1 , severely undermining Imperial military production . Six years before the destruction of the Hosnian system , an unofficial political faction in the New Republic ' s Galactic Senate known to admire the Galactic Empire ' s rule , the Centrists , questioned the official New Republic historical accounts of the Battle of Yavin and the Galactic Civil War . They believed that the Death Star was destroyed by an Imperial traitor and not by Luke Skywalker and the Rebel Alliance . Behind the scenes . In a Korean webcomic released in 2015 and written and drawn by Hong Jac Ga , the Battle of Yavin is often referred to as the Miracle of Yavin .