Mystery plane from Lithuania flew over NATO countries without permission and landed in Bulgaria

The plane violated the airspace of six countries of the Alliance.

The Lithuanian police are investigating the circumstances of the flight of a mysterious plane that flew without permission through the airspace of six NATO member countries.

This is reported LRT.

The mysterious flight was reported to the Bulgarian authorities on Thursday. A small plane took off from Lithuania and flew over Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, Romania without permission and landed in Bulgaria, attracting the attention of the air force.

Having flown about 1600 km, the unknown crew left the plane immediately after landing.

Police Department spokesman Ramunas Matonis told BNS news agency that the pre-trial investigation into the case has not yet begun, “circumstances are being clarified” at present.

There were two people on the plane. The aircraft did not have an approved flight plan, and the aircraft’s transponders were turned off. The pilot did not respond to radio requests and visual signals. In Hungary and Romania, fighter jets escorted the plane to Bulgaria.

Air navigation reported that the plane’s crew did not contact the operators and did not receive flight plans.

According to LRT, the Piper PA-23-250 Aztec aircraft made the mysterious flight. Pilot Bronius Zaronskis sold him last week. At the same time, the man assures that the identity of the buyer is unknown to him.

“They weren’t Lithuanians. I can’t tell what country they are from – maybe Ukrainians, maybe Romanians or Bulgarians. We spoke with one person in Russian… I don’t know the names of the men, I wasn’t interested,” Zaronskis commented.

The former owner of the aircraft added that a certain organization had acquired it.

“I sold and said goodbye to this aircraft. I have been selling it for many years, I had nowhere to put it, so I am glad that they bought it … I don’t remember which organization bought it. Some hieroglyphs were written in a foreign language, hard to even read,” Zaronskis said.

According to the man, the Piper PA-23-250 Aztec is a six-seater, and the people who bought it were friendly.