Romanian F-16s shoot down two Geran drones over Black Sea

Two Romanian F-16 fighter jets shot down two Geran-family attack drones over the country’s territorial waters on Saturday, October 17, the Defense Ministry announced. Both drones were destroyed shortly after entering Romanian airspace.

Military radar initially detected a group of aerial targets flying southwest approximately 120 kilometers east of Snake Island. Two F-16s on air-policing duty took off from the 86th Air Base at Borcea at 5:43 p.m.

The first drone was shot down southeast of Sulina at 6:01 p.m., after spending two minutes in Romanian airspace, the ministry said. The second was destroyed east of Sulina at 6:05 p.m., following a five-minute incursion.

The Defense Ministry identified them as jet-powered attack drones from the Geran family.

Interim defense minister Radu Miruță said the operation marked three firsts for the Romanian military, beginning with the rapid destruction of two consecutive targets by the same pair of fighter jets.

“Two drones out of two that entered consecutively were shot down by the same crew, four and a half minutes apart. That is a first,” he stated, as quoted by News.ro.

The minister also pointed to how quickly the first drone was intercepted, two minutes after crossing into Romanian airspace. He said statistical modeling had allowed the F-16s to position themselves in advance near the expected point of entry.

“The fighter jets were waiting exactly at the point where the violation of Romanian airspace was estimated to occur, which demonstrates the very careful work carried out so far,” Radu Miruță said.

The third first concerned the type of drone encountered. Minister Miruță explained that the targets were believed to be Russian Geran-4 drones capable of flying at approximately 450 kilometers per hour, considerably faster than the drones Romanian pilots had previously faced.

“It is the first time we have shot down drones of this type,” he said.

Before Saturday’s incident, Romanian military radar had detected aerial targets near the border in Ukrainian airspace on eight separate occasions during the previous week. Drones briefly entered Romanian airspace in four of those cases, according to the ministry.