“Our MQ-9 plane was conducting routine operations in worldwide airspace when it was intercepted and hit by a Russian plane, leading to a crash and full lack of the MQ-9,” mentioned Gen. James B. Hecker, a senior navy official overseeing Air Power operations within the area. “Actually, this unsafe and unprofessional act by the Russians almost brought on each plane to crash.”
The Russian Embassy in Washington didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
A State Division spokesman, Ned Worth, informed reporters that senior U.S. officers would keep in touch with their Russian counterparts to speak “our robust objections.”
“We’re summoning the Russian ambassador to the division the place we’ll convey this message,” Worth mentioned, including that, in Moscow, the U.S. ambassador to Russia, Lynne M. Tracy, had relayed the Biden administration’s dissatisfaction to the Ministry of Overseas Affairs.
Major operate: Intelligence assortment
in help of strike, coordination
and reconnaissance missions.
Crew (distant): Two (pilot and sensor operator)
Ceiling: As much as 50,000 toes
Word: Knowledge present as of March 2021
Major operate: Intelligence assortment in help of strike, coordination
and reconnaissance missions.
Ceiling: As much as 50,000 toes
Crew (distant): Two (pilot and sensor operator)
Word: Knowledge present as of March 2021
It was not instantly clear the place over the Black Sea the incident occurred or what mission the drone was conducting. U.S. navy officers additionally didn’t instantly specify what different current actions by Russian pilots match into the sample of harmful exercise that they described.
White Home spokesman John Kirby mentioned that President Biden was briefed concerning the incident on Tuesday morning by nationwide safety adviser Jake Sullivan. Whereas intercepts of plane occur with some frequency, Kirby mentioned, “this one, clearly, is noteworthy due to how unsafe [and] certainly reckless” the Su-27s had been “in inflicting the downing of one in every of our plane.”
U.S. and Russian militaries arrange years in the past a cellphone line for the “deconfliction” of air operations to keep away from collisions and different incidents that might doubtlessly immediate a disaster. Kirby mentioned the Black Sea is “an unlimited physique of water,” and U.S. plane have been flying in worldwide airspace there “constantly” for a yr.
“We’re going to proceed to try this,” Kirby mentioned. “And we don’t must have some form of check-in with the Russians earlier than we fly in worldwide airspace.”