Romania destroys a sea drone and finds aerial drone debris on its soil amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine
Both incidents occurred during the same overnight barrage that also triggered air defense activations in Poland and Moldova.
Romania targeted and destroyed a heavily armed sea drone near its crucial Neptun Deep gas platform, while also recovering remnants from a separate aerial drone that crashed on its soil, according to the Romanian Defense Ministry. This occurred during a major Russian assault on Ukraine on August 20th, which resulted in 14 fatalities in Kyiv and affected Moldova, prompting Poland to activate its air defense.
Russia's ongoing conflict with Ukraine has rendered the Black Sea and NATO's eastern airspace a persistent security concern. This year, Romanian forces have neutralized five drones over or close to their territory, alongside over 150 mines drifting across the Black Sea trade routes since the full-scale invasion began. An F-16 aircraft fired a cannon at the sea drone near the gas platform, marking Romania's first use of a cannon against a drone and a drone engagement.
All prior encounters utilized air-to-air missiles. The Defense Minister, Radu Miruță, stated the drone was carrying explosives and was detected just hundreds of meters from the platform housing several hundred workers. Ukraine's National Army confirmed the drone was not of Ukrainian origin, with President Nicușor Dan attributing responsibility to Russia, condemning the escalation of such irresponsible acts by the Russian Federation.
The incident followed Romanian navy divers' destruction of two Gerbera-type drones near the same platform the previous day via controlled detonation.
Earlier that night, Romanian radar detected aerial targets near the Ukrainian border at 02:23, leading to the activation of Spanish F-18s from NATO's air policing mission and a Romanian IAR-330 SOCAT helicopter. At 03:21, a drone entered Romanian airspace 13 km east of Galați and crashed three minutes later near Grindu in Tulcea County, causing no injuries or damage. This event came four days after a Spanish F-18 shot down another drone over Romanian airspace. Romanian F-16s intercepted three Russian drones in July.
In response to the Russian attack, Poland activated its military aircraft and ground-based air defense systems as a precautionary measure, with the Netherlands providing air defense support. No breach of Polish airspace was recorded. In Moldova, the National Army detected a Shahed-136/Geran-2 drone crossing from Ukraine into the Gagauzia region of Moldova's Odesa Oblast at 03:16, only to return to Ukrainian airspace six minutes later.
Written by urgent.news from Euromaidan Press's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
