Two countries raise their fighter jets during Russia's massive attack on Ukraine
Fighter jets (Illustrative photo: EPA)

The Polish and Romanian air forces scrambled their fighter jets because of Russia's large-scale air attack on Ukraine on the night of July 21. This was reported by Operational Command of the Armed Forces Poland and Ministry of Defense of Romania.

As noted by the Polish command, the air force has raised fighter jets, and ground-based air defense and radar reconnaissance systems have been put on high alert.

At the same time, the Romanian Ministry of Defense reported that at about 03:00, the ministry's surveillance radars detected air targets moving in different trajectories in Ukrainian airspace, north of the border with Romania, near the Maramures-Sucava area.

At about 03:30, two Romanian F-16 fighters took off from the 86th Borca air base to conduct reconnaissance missions.

Around 05:00, two Italian Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon fighters were also ordered to take off from the Mihai Cogelnicianu base (57th Air Base), which is carrying out Air Police missions.

"During the operations conducted between 03:30 and 06:00, 12 Ukrainian airborne targets were detected in Ukrainian airspace north of the Romanian border. Four of them unintentionally entered Romanian airspace for several minutes, in the areas of Sighetu Marmatiei and Vicovu de Sus. They did not pose a real threat to national security, human life or Romanian property," the statement said.

After the missions were completed, Romanian Air Force F-16 fighters landed at about 06:00 at the Borca base, and Italian Eurofighter Typhoons landed at about 07:00 at the Mihai Cogelnicianu base.