Five drones crossed Moldovan airspace hours before Independence Day parade

Moldova’s National Army recorded five unauthorized drone flights through national airspace during the early hours of August 27, 2026, hours before the country marked 35 years of independence with a military parade in Chișinău. 

The National Army’s Air Operations Service said the tracks were established jointly with partners and that the flights followed Russian air attacks on Ukraine overnight. Every crossing took place along the southeastern frontier in the Stefan Voda district, the stretch of border that absorbs most of the traffic reaching Moldova from the Odesa region. 

Five crossings, two tracks lost  

The first drone entered from the direction of Beleaevka toward Palanca at 03:56 local time and left on the same axis a minute later. A second came in from Starokazacie and was detected near Caplani at 03:59. A third crossed at 04:09 and flew a longer inland track through Palanca, Crocmaz, Olanesti, Purcari and Rascaeti. A fourth crossed near Palanca at 04:16 and turned straight back toward Maiaki in Ukraine. A fifth object moved across the border at the Saiti crossing point at 05:50 and left national airspace toward Lesnoie at 06:02. 

Two of the five were never tracked out. The Air Operations Service said the second drone disappeared from monitoring systems at 04:10 near Carahasani, and the third at 04:24 near Pervomaisc, in the Transnistrian sector, where Chișinău has no access for ground checks. 

The statement reported no wreckage and made no mention of an airspace closure or diversions, unlike the emergency NOTAM issued during a similar incursion in November 2025, which sent two inbound flights to Romania. 

A familiar route through undefended airspace  

The third drone passed directly over Crocmaz, where another drone struck less than three weeks earlier. On August 9, 2026, the object hit a tree and detonated about 2.5 meters above the ground, shattering windows in a nearby house and starting a vegetation fire. Police said it was the first time that type of drone had been recorded in Moldova. 

Moldova can see this traffic but cannot engage it. The Thales Ground Master 200 radar, delivered in December 2023, provides the Moldovan Air Force Command with coverage out to 250 kilometers (155 miles). An EU-funded radar contract signed on April 5, 2024, was scheduled for delivery in the first half of 2026. The country still fields no system capable of downing a drone, and its air force operates no combat aircraft. 

Neighboring Romania logged 25 incursions during 2026 against nine in all of 2025, and allied fighters on air policing duty there have shot down four drones since July 2026, at least one of which approached through Moldovan airspace. 

The parade that followed on the afternoon of August 27, 2026, put more than 100 vehicles and systems on display, including anti-aircraft systems and airspace monitoring equipment, with color guard detachments from Romania, Ukraine, Lithuania, Italy, Poland, France, the Czech Republic, and the US. The post Five drones crossed Moldovan airspace hours before Independence Day parade appeared first on AeroTime.

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