Key takeaways:
- The U.S. military released footage of a mid-air encounter between a Russian fighter jet and a US drone that ended with the drone crashing into the Black Sea.
- The incident has raised tensions between the two countries, with the U.S. military accusing the Russian fighter jet of conducting an unsafe intercept of the drone in international airspace.
- The U.S. has called on Russia to investigate the incident and take steps to prevent similar incidents in the future.
The U.S. military has released footage of a mid-air encounter between a Russian fighter jet and a US drone that ended with the drone crashing into the Black Sea.
The 42-second video, released Thursday, shows a Russian Su-27 approaching the back of the MQ-9 drone and beginning to release fuel as it passes, the Pentagon said. The U.S. military said it ditched the MQ-9 Reaper in the sea on Tuesday after the Russian fighter jet poured fuel on the unmanned aerial vehicle, in an apparent attempt to blind its optical sensors.
U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters the unmanned aerial vehicle had likely broken during the crash and whatever debris was left likely sank to a depth of thousands of feet in the Black Sea.
On Wednesday, a senior Russian official said Moscow would try to recover the wreckage of the drone. The U.S. military has not yet commented on the Russian official’s statement.
The incident has raised tensions between the two countries, with the U.S. military accusing the Russian fighter jet of conducting an unsafe intercept of the drone in international airspace. The U.S. has called on Russia to investigate the incident and take steps to prevent similar incidents in the future.
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