A Russian warplane flying in international airspace over the Black Sea came within 10 feet of a U.S. Air Force reconnaissance plane last month, CNN reported Thursday night.
The Russian fighter jet reportedly flanked the U.S. reconnaissance plane at high speed, broke off, and then followed the American plane before finally disengaging in the May 30 event.
According to CNN, The U.S. Air Force reconnaissance plane did not engage or try to depart the area, and there is no present information suggesting the incident sparked a foreign policy problem or led to a diplomatic protest from either side.
The recent May 30 event came only weeks after another aerial event between the two superpowers in Europe when a U.S. RC-135U flying in international airspace was intercepted by a Russian SU-27 Flanker in what officials termed an “unsafe and unprofessional manner.”
Earlier this month, a Russian Su-24 aircraft did a flyby past the USS Ross guided missile destroyer, also in the Black Sea. The U.S. Navy is releasing video of the flyby to debunk Russian news reports that suggested the American naval vessel retreated from the Su-24 supersonic attack plane.
U.S. defense officials said the Russian warplane was not armed. The flyby was considered routine because there are so many military aircraft from NATO and Russia flying over the Baltics and the Black Sea. Still, the two aerial events received considerable attention at the Pentagon because they created potential danger to the U.S. personnel.
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Since 2006, Russian long range strategic bombers have buzzed U.S. airspace coming as close as 50 miles of the California coastline. NORAD has confirmed for The Washington Times that there have been at least 50 incidents in the past 10 years in which U.S. warplanes intercepted Russian military aircraft entering the Air Defense International Zone, an area outside U.S. sovereignty, but heavily patrolled by civil and military aircraft.
• Jeffrey Scott Shapiro can be reached at jshapiro@washingtontimes.com.
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