BUCHAREST — Romania announced Saturday that it had intercepted and shot down a second drone that violated its national airspace within two consecutive days, this time over a lightly populated region near the Ukrainian border.
The previous drone, which Romanian prosecutors determined from examined fragments was Russian in origin, was brought down on Friday — marking the first time Romania had taken such action despite dozens of prior airspace violations.
President Nicusor Dan posted on social media that the second drone was shot down at 8:30 a.m. local time (0530 GMT), approximately 10 kilometers — about 6 miles — west of Sfantu Gheorghe in the Danube Delta region.
Romania’s defense ministry reported that radar systems detected the airspace breach at 8:22 a.m., after which two F-16 fighter jets were immediately deployed. Officials did not identify the origin of Saturday’s drone, though prosecutors had confirmed the Friday drone was Russian.
Romania shares a 650-kilometer, or roughly 400-mile, land border with Ukraine. Authorities said Russian drones have violated Romanian airspace approximately 30 times since Moscow began targeting Ukrainian ports along the Danube River following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Earlier this year in May, a Russian drone struck an apartment building in the southeastern Romanian city of Galati, near the Ukrainian border, leaving two people injured. That incident marked the first time a drone strike during the Ukraine conflict caused casualties inside a densely populated area within a NATO member nation.
On Friday, the Romanian army’s chief of staff, General Gheorghita Vlad, noted that Russian attacks on the area surrounding the Ukrainian port of Odesa had intensified ahead of the harvest season, placing additional strain on critical energy and trade routes throughout the Black Sea region.
