Romania raises F-16s, Eurofighters during Russian drone attack on Ukraine

The Romanian Ministry of Defense shared the information in a statement.

During the latest Russian attack on Ukraine, Romania declared an air alert in the Tulcea district around 11:30 p.m. local time. Authorities warned residents in the northeastern part of the region through the RO-ALERT system.

“The monitoring and surveillance systems of the Ministry of National Defense constantly monitored the airspace in the area,” the Romanian Defense Ministry said.

Two F-16 aircraft of the Romanian Air Force and two Eurofighter aircraft of the Italian Air Force, which were part of the air police service, took off to perform surveillance and protection of Romanian airspace.

The air alert was lifted at around 04:50 a.m., and the combat aircraft returned to their home bases.

“Romania's radar surveillance system indicated the possibility that the trajectory of one of the drones involved in the attack crossed the national airspace for a very short time at a distance of up to 500 meters,” the Romanian Defense Ministry said.

They added that the last contact with this air target was detected on Ukrainian territory.

On Tuesday, the Romanian defense ministry will check the areas where the drone debris may have fallen and monitor the airspace. It condemned Russia's attacks on Ukraine as illegal and in violation of international law.

• Last night, occupying Russian forces launched a hundred attack drones to strike Ukraine. Ukrainian defenders destroyed 37 of them. Kharkiv, Donetsk, Dnipropetrovsk and Kyiv regions suffered as a result of the Russian attack. The attack killed a child in the Dnipropetrovsk region, and injured more civilians in Kyiv.