Second strange aircraft over Bulgaria – MiG-29 chases and lands training aircraft “Chesna” (Overview)
Pilot: I will seek my rights
They are still looking for who brought that plane from Lithuania and disappeared
A small training plane with a transponder (an electronic device used for recognition) off picked up on the claws of the NATO Air Force Command, which followed the Bulgarian MiG-29s chasing over Svishtov. The case of unidentified flights over Bulgaria is the second in a month and has caused a military and expert to start to doubt
whether someone doesn’t the security test
of the Bulgarian airspace.
“Bulgarian MiG-29 fighter jets have intercepted and landed an aircraft trespassing on our airspace,” the Ministry of Defense announced around 1 a.m. on Thursday, although the incident still happened around 6 p.m. on Wednesday. Subsequently, it became clear that the landed plane was a training “Chesna-150” with a damaged radio station, and only one MiG-29 was raised to chase.
“Chesnata” appeared on the radars around Svishtov at an altitude of 600 m and entered an activated temporarily reserved area without a flight plan and without an on-board device for connection with ground radars, the Ministry of Defense announced.
The MiG-29s on duty were activated almost immediately from Graf Ignatievo Air Base. The pilot of the pair took off at 5.53pm and made visual contact with the pilot of the small plane at 6.03pm. The fighter escorted him to the Pleven Bohot airport 5 minutes later.
“According to the established procedures, after landing, the fighter on duty blocked the airport until the engine was established and the ground authorities intervened. The identity of the pilot of the small plane was established on the ground”, the Ministry of Defense stated in its announcement. They also include that some of the youngest airmen of the Air Force joined the task.
“The pilot of the “Chesnata” was not aggressive and it was not a correct attempt to escape, said the commander of the Graf Ignatievo Air Base, Gen. Nikolai Rusev.
“I have no idea why I was intercepted. When performing a training flight at 4 p.m. due to technical problems at the radio station, they get on the plane to test it. I didn’t go to Svishtov, but I performed a task about 20 km from the Bohot airport, after which I was intercepted by an Air Force plane”, however, the pilot of the small plane Valeri Iliev told his version.
“The fighter performed several maneuvers over me and I realized that I was intercepted. I completed my task and landed at the airport, then the police poured in,” he said. He was later taken to the police station, where they kept him until the morning.
“It snowed my testimony. I will make demands. This
violates my freedom and tarnish my name”,
he was categorical.
Iliev has been training pilots since he was 10 years old. The plane with which he flew is owned by “Olympia Air” – a school for training pilots in civil aviation. Their graduates make 20-30 flights a day in the area.
“I am not a violator, the information is not given by Bulgaria, but by the NATO command. In aviation, there is a G space – a segment of airspace up to a certain altitude, in which any aircraft owner can fly without calling anyone. I always call. I have not broken any laws, nor have I caused panic,” Iliev told “Bulgaria on Air”. According to him, it is an “annoying mistake” and it is assumed that the Romanian Air Force gave information about a certain object and the one on the object was mistakenly intercepted by our Air Force.
The plane is trained and, as a rule, moves at this height, without being obliged to include a transponder, the owner of Bohot airport Anton Georgiev said. He emphasizes that the plane is already closed in the hangar. And the situation is defined as “comic”.
“This is a standard procedure.
Ours they are fighter jets raised by signal from the command of NATO
Obviously, the plane is a correct action, which the NATO center has perceived as a potential risk”, said, however, on Thursday afternoon the Minister of Defense Dragomir Zakov. He emphasizes that after such a signal, the raising of the fighters is mandatory.
At the beginning of June, a bigger scandal was caused by a small twin-engine Beechcraft plane that took off from Latvia, passed through Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania, refueled at the airport near Vidin, then took off and reached the airport in the village of Bukhovtsi to Targovishte, where was found abandoned. Like all the way from Latvia to Bukhovtsi, the NATO defenses did not activate, and our pilots excused themselves that a thunderstorm prevented them from catching it.
“After the plane entered Bulgaria under complex hydrometeorological conditions, the Air Force was activated,” Zakov assured then. He is adamant that the military has kept all the procedures in place for those who took off at risk of not being able to return because of the storm. The minister also emphasizes that there was no threat to national security. However, it was not clear why the fighter jets did not escort the plane to the nearest airport, but it was allowed to land and its crew escaped.
After it was found near Bukhovtsi, the plane was searched by the police according to the version, if it was not carrying drugs. The prosecutor’s office in Targovishte opened a case for the illegal seizure of an airplane. The investigation is still ongoing, and the identity of the pilot of the Lithuanian plane is unclear. The pilot was an ace to fly so low, in the dark and during a storm, this expert commented.
The District Prosecutor’s Office in Targovishte told “24 Chasa” yesterday that they have nothing to share with the media.
Similar cases made aviation expert Angel Borisov suspect that someone was testing the Air Force. According to Defense Chief Admiral Emil Eftimov, however, Wednesday’s flight was not a test, an error.