| Date | 12 Sep 2026 |
| Tracker | European Airspace Violations |
| Type | Strike |
| Location |
Botosenita Mare, Suceava County, Romania
47.87, 26.11 (approximate) |
Air operations control centres in Ukraine and Moldova warned Romania's Ministry of National Defence on the afternoon of 12 September 2026 that a drone had crossed both countries' airspace towards north-eastern Romania. Two F-16s took off from the 86th Air Base at Borcea to track it, and RO-Alert warnings went out in Botosani and Suceava counties from 16:20. The aircraft came down in a cornfield near Botosenita Mare, in Calafindesti commune, Suceava County, leaving a crater about a metre across and 30 centimetres deep and starting a small fire; nobody was hurt. A bomb-disposal team was sent to the site and prosecutors opened an inquiry. The ministry named no operator.
| Date | Type | Incident |
|---|---|---|
| 8 Sep 2026 | Strike | Shahed-type drone crosses Moldova into Romania and comes down back on Moldovan soil |
| 14 Sep 2026 | Incursion | Two drones cross Moldovan airspace at Palanca and Cioburciu within the hour |
| 15 Sep 2026 | Incursion | Russian Gerbera drone crosses from Belarus into Lithuanian airspace and is shot down near Kaunas |
| 17 Sep 2026 | Incursion | Unidentified drone crosses Moldovan airspace at Tudora for two minutes |
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.