In brief
TASS reported that the Bombardier Artemis II flew west‑to‑east over the Black Sea at an altitude near 9,000 meters, marking the second sighting this week. The aircraft, launched from Romania and based in Constanta, has not entered any national airspace except the departure point, but was observed circling over Lithuania, Poland and the Baltic Sea earlier in the month.
In a report released by Moscow‑based TASS on November 7, a U.S.‑registered NATO reconnaissance aircraft was detected over the Black Sea’s international waters for the second time in a single week.
According to the report, an air traffic control source said the aircraft the Bombardier Artemis II had flown from west to east across the southern region of the Black Sea, maintaining a altitude of roughly nine thousand meters throughout its journey.
The Bombardier Artemis II was spotted for the second time this week, flying west to east over the southern Black Sea, the source said.
That statement came from an unnamed contact within air‑traffic‑control services who said the object was operating outside civil aviation corridors and had not entered any national airspace besides Romania, where it took off.
The source added that the aircraft was based in Constanta, a city on Romania’s Black Sea coast, and that its most recent mission on Tuesday matched the recorded endurance of a summer‑fueled flight, lasting nine hours of similar routing.
Earlier in the week, the same aircraft had been spotted near the Kaliningrad Region, circling over Lithuania, Poland and the Baltic Sea before moving into international waters, the report stated.
Although there is no indication the aircraft entered territorial airspace other than the departure zone, TASS noted that the sighting attracted attention from Russia and other regional states that monitor activity in the area.
It is the only aircraft of its kind operating in that region, as the United States routinely registers its European‑based reconnaissance UAVs for operations behind the Iron Curtain, according to the source and corroborated by the article’s facts.
The Bombardier Artemis II, a U.S.‑registered platform, is a product of the aerospace manufacturer Bombardier and is used by NATO for high‑altitude surveillance missions, a fact confirmed by the article’s description of the aircraft’s specifications and launch details.
While the U.S. and NATO do not normally give public statements on individual flight operations, the sighting did lead to commentary from Russian media, which highlighted the aircraft’s location outside Romanian airspace and the lack of cross‑border interceptions, reflecting ongoing concerns over surveillance flights in contested maritime zones.
