diff --git a/.github/actions/release_branch_extraction/action.yml b/.github/actions/release_branch_extraction/action.yml
index 9d81e44ba8845d..ba851a5a01a234 100644
--- a/.github/actions/release_branch_extraction/action.yml
+++ b/.github/actions/release_branch_extraction/action.yml
@@ -35,5 +35,20 @@ runs:
       id: release_branch_extraction_step
       shell: bash
       run: |
+        # fetch branch information first
         git fetch origin
-        git branch -r
+        
+        release_branches_ordered_by_version="$(git branch -r | grep origin | grep -o '[^/]*$' | grep 'release-[1-9]\.[0-9]*$' | sort --field-separator '-' --key 2V)"
+        
+        newest_release_branch="$(echo $release_branches_ordered_by_version | tail -1 | head -1)"
+        penultimate_release_branch="$(echo $release_branches_ordered_by_version | tail -2 | head -1)"
+        antepenultimate_release_branch="$(echo $release_branches_ordered_by_version | tail -3 | head -1)"
+
+        echo "Extracted release branches:"
+        echo "    Branch of newest release: ${newest_release_branch}"
+        echo "    Branch of release that preceded the newest release: ${penultimate_release_branch}"
+        echo "    Branch of that got deprecated most-recently: ${antepenultimate_release_branch}"
+        
+        echo "newest_release=${newest_release_branch}" >> ${GITHUB_OUTPUT}
+        echo "penultimate_release=${penultimate_release_branch}" >> ${GITHUB_OUTPUT}
+        echo "antepenultimate_release=${antepenultimate_release_branch}" >> ${GITHUB_OUTPUT}