(Washington) The US military released footage Thursday of the Russian military intercepting its drone over the Black Sea, showing a fighter jet spraying fuel on the aircraft, which is then seen with a damaged propeller blade.
The declassified video footage released on the US Armed Forces Europe Command website lasts 42 seconds and shows a Russian Sukhoi-27 passing twice just above the drone, after approaching it from behind.
The Reaper MQ-9 fell in international waters after being hit, according to Washington, by a Russian fighter. Moscow admits the interception of the aircraft by its fighter jets, but denies any contact that would have led to the crash.
This is “a reckless and dangerous action,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, visiting Addis Ababa.
On the first pass, no shock is visible between the two devices, nor anything that seems to justify the fall of the drone.
The maneuver “disrupts video transmission”, comments the US Army Europe site, which notes that the drone’s propeller “can be seen and remains intact”.
During a second pass, without it being established whether it is the same fighter or a second one, the maneuver is similar, but the aircraft passes even closer to the drone.
The image transmission is then interrupted for 60 seconds. When it resumes, “the propeller can be seen again and one of the blades can be seen to be damaged,” notes the US Air Force.
The “maneuver is frankly borderline”, a fighter pilot from a European army told AFP, stressing that, according to the rules in force usually, an interception in the sky by a combat aircraft is done “in parallel”. of the intercepted aircraft and never at such a close distance.
On Tuesday, General James Hecker, commander of US air forces in Europe, said an MQ-9 Reaper performing “routine operations in international airspace” was intercepted by Su-27 fighters and then “rammed by a Russian aircraft, resulting in the downing and loss” of the drone.
While acknowledging that two fighters had come to intercept the drone, Russia claimed not to be responsible for its fall.
This is the first time since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022 that a NATO country has admitted losing equipment operated by itself in this highly flammable region.
Moscow claims to want to fish out the drone to prove, in its view, the involvement of the United States in the operations in Ukraine.
On Wednesday, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said one of the causes of the incident was the “stepping up” of US spy operations.
Washington has however indicated that it has taken measures to protect potential sensitive data still present in the device.
“We are confident that what was valuable is no longer valuable,” said US Chief of Staff General Mark Milley.
The skies of the Black Sea are the scene of very regular interactions between drones and aircraft from NATO countries and the Russian armed forces, especially since the start of the war in Ukraine.
The United States uses Reaper MQ-9 drones for surveillance, intelligence gathering and strikes. Several aircraft have been lost in recent years, including one shot down by a surface-to-air missile over Yemen in 2019, according to US Central Command.
