Drone almost struck Zelenskyy’s plane, says Ukraine

A jet-powered attack drone nearly collided with Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s aeroplane on Tuesday, according to a Ukrainian official flying with the president.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre on Wednesday told public broadcaster NRK that Zelenskyy’s “plane was almost hit by a drone as it was about to take off from Moldova”.

A senior Ukrainian official aboard the plane with Zelenskyy confirmed the report and said they believed it was a Russian Shahed-type drone powered by a jet engine.

The Kremlin did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The attack was launched as Zelenskyy flew to Norway to attend the funeral of King Harald. Moldovan authorities temporarily halted operations at Chișinău airport following the incident.

A Moldovan government spokesperson said on Wednesday that the country had closed its airspace on Tuesday, shortly after 16.30, after a Russian drone violated its airspace. They said the drone had entered Moldovan airspace from the direction of Ukraine.

The spokesperson added that at about 17.20, the drone exploded near Mihăilenii Vechi, in the Râșcani district, some 160km from Chișinău international airport.

Moldovan air traffic and Ukrainian military tracking records viewed by the FT indicated that a jet-powered attack drone crossed Ukraine’s border at about 16.20 local time, travelling west towards Moldova.

At 16.38, the drone entered Romanian airspace and by 16.47 the target was being tracked about 70km inside Romania and continued on a westerly course.

The drone subsequently re-entered Moldovan airspace at 17.04, but radar contact was lost 10 minutes later.

Russia has recently stepped up strikes using jet-powered drones in barrages with ballistic missiles that Ukrainian air defences have struggled to counter.

The incident on Tuesday prompted heightened security around Chișinău airport. Zelenskyy also offered the use of a Ukrainian F-16 fighter jet to intercept the drone, according to Ukrainian officials.

The Norwegian prime minister did not say whether the aircraft had been directly targeted or how close the drone came to the plane. But the Ukrainian official travelling with Zelenskyy said the drone came so close that it could have been targeting the plane. Ukrainian authorities are investigating the incident.

The Ukrainian official said there was no damage or casualties.

The incident comes after high-level visits by Donald Trump’s special envoys to Moscow and Kyiv, where they were trying to reinvigorate peace talks that stalled after the start of the US war in Iran.

It also highlighted the growing risks posed by the war in Ukraine to neighbouring countries and civilian aviation in the region, as drones and missiles have increasingly crossed into EU and Nato airspace during Russian attacks on Ukraine in recent months.

Additional reporting by Max Seddon in Berlin