| Date | 19 Sep 2025 |
| Tracker | European Airspace Violations |
| Type | Incursion |
| Location |
Vaindloo Island, Estonia
59.82, 26.36 (approximate) |
Three Russian MiG-31 interceptors violated Estonian airspace near Vaindloo island in the Gulf of Finland for a total of twelve minutes, flying without filed flight plans and with their transponders switched off. The Estonian Defence Forces published a chart showing the aircraft tracking in a straight line parallel to the border from east to west. Estonia summoned the Russian chargé d'affaires and handed over a diplomatic note, then invoked Article 4 of the North Atlantic Treaty — the second such invocation in ten days.
| Date | Type | Incident |
|---|---|---|
| 9 Sep 2025 | Interception | NATO shoots down Russian drones in the largest incursion into Poland |
| 13 Sep 2025 | Incursion | Russian drone tracked for 50 minutes over Romanian airspace |
| 19 Sep 2025 | Incursion | Russian fighters violate safety zone of Polish drilling platform |
| 22 Sep 2025 | Incursion | Unidentified drones close Copenhagen and Oslo airports |
GlobalMilitary.net's 2026 inventory snapshot shows nine NATO members — Iceland, Luxembourg, the three Baltic states, Montenegro, Albania, North Macedonia and Slovenia — hold no fixed-wing fighters, attack aircraft or bombers and depend on Allied air policing.
GlobalMilitary.net's incident log counts 45 established violations of European airspace between January 1 and August 16, 2026, against 31 for the whole of 2025 - and almost all of the growth sits in incidents that ended with a shootdown or an explosion on the ground.
An Italian Eurofighter on NATO Baltic Air Policing duty destroyed an unidentified drone over eastern Latvia before dawn on 14 August, the second time the alliance's quick-reaction force has shot one down over the country this year.