| Date | 17 Oct 2026 |
| Tracker | European Airspace Violations |
| Type | Interception |
| Location |
Sulina, Tulcea County, Romania
45.16, 29.65 (approximate) |
Romania's Ministry of National Defence said its radar tracked a group of aerial targets about 120 kilometres east of Snake Island, heading south-west, on the evening of 17 October 2026, and two Romanian F-16s on air policing duty took off from Borcea at 17:43. According to the ministry, both targets, jet-powered attack drones of the Geran family, were shot down above Romanian territorial waters: the first at 18:01 south-east of Sulina after two minutes in national airspace, the second at 18:05 east of Sulina after five. The acting defence minister said their speed pointed to new Russian-developed models.
| Date | Type | Incident |
|---|---|---|
| 14 Oct 2026 | Incursion | Four aerial targets cross into Romanian airspace off Sulina in three waves |
| 15 Oct 2026 | Incursion | Russian drone crosses south-eastern Moldova over Purcari for eight minutes |
| 15 Oct 2026 | Incursion | Drone enters Romanian airspace south-east of Sulina for about a minute |
| 16 Oct 2026 | Strike | Drone crashes and explodes near Codrenii Noi after four overnight crossings of Moldova |
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.