One day before the NATO summit was to convene in Ankara on July 7, the UK Ministry of Defense charged that on July 2 two Russian maritime patrol aircraft [cited as only one in the quote below—ed.] flew dangerously close to the aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales, operating in the Norwegian Sea, and dropped sonobuoys—used to hunt submarines—in close proximity to the carrier. The planes, which had been intercepted and escorted by British F-35Bs from the carrier on July 2, had repeatedly approached the UK’s carrier strike group in an “unsafe and unprofessional” maneuver, the MoD added, reported The Telegraph.
“While operating in the Norwegian Sea on Operation Firecrest, the UK’s Carrier Strike Group was repeatedly approached by a Russian ‘Bear-F’ maritime patrol aircraft,” a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense said. “The Bear-F passed at low altitude and unnecessarily close to HMS Prince of Wales and dropped a large number of sonobuoys in close proximity to the carrier. This activity was unsafe and unprofessional. The Russian aircraft was intercepted and escorted by two UK F-35 jets from HMS Prince of Wales until it left the area.”
No Russian response to the British accusation has been reported.
