NATO spy plane flies over Black Sea again, long surveillance logged

A NATO reconnaissance plane spotted again over neutral Black Sea waters, patrolling for several hours, a source in air traffic control told TASS.

“For several hours, we have observed a reconnaissance aircraft, based on the Bombardier Challenger 650 platform and conducting primarily electronic intelligence operations,” the source said.

The source noted that the plane has repeatedly flown over the Black Sea at an altitude of around 10 kilometres, without entering the airspace of other countries, apart from its departure point in Romania. The flight path does not intersect with regular corridors used by civilian aircraft.

The source also added that this particular aircraft has been recorded over the Black Sea multiple times before.

Since Russia’s full‑scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, NATO and allied surveillance flights — often using long‑endurance reconnaissance aircraft like RC‑135 Rivet Joint, RQ‑4 Global Hawk and P‑8 Poseidon — have increased over the Black Sea to monitor Russian military activity around Crimea and the wider sea region.

NATO member states coordinate these missions publicly as part of routine intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) activity aimed at enhancing situational awareness along the Alliance’s eastern flank, including monitoring radar, communications and air‑defence systems.

A recent example is a Swedish Air Force Gulfstream IV ISR flight conducted over the western Black Sea on February 23, 2026, flying patterned orbits southeast of Constanța to collect electronic emissions and enhance NATO’s intelligence picture in the region.

These flights operate in international airspace and are intended to reinforce transparency and deterrence amid heightened geopolitical tension, but they have periodically drawn reactions from Russia, which regularly tracks or intercepts them.

Long‑standing practice includes patrols close to the Russian military presence on the western Black Sea — a pattern that has continued into early 2026 with coordinated missions involving NATO and UK aircraft.

By Jeyhun Aghazada