The North American Aerospace Defense Command detected and tracked four Russian military aircraft Tuesday as they passed through international airspace off Alaska’s coasts.
NORAD dispatched four F-16 fighters and an air tanker from Eielson Air Force Base and an electronic surveillance plane out of Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson to intercept the aircraft.
A NORAD news release issued Wednesday says the four Russian aircraft remained in the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone throughout the 15-hour flight and did not enter sovereign U.S. airspace. A NORAD spokesperson on Thursday identified the aircraft as two Tu-95 Bear bombers and two Su-35 Flanker fighter jets.
Russian aircraft regularly fly through the Alaska air defense ID zone, and the news release says U.S. and allied military officials don’t see it as a threat. University of Alaska Fairbanks military affairs expert Cameron Carlson says international law permits those flights.
“They’re not penetrating the sovereign territory of these nations,” he said. “They’re going in there, and they have by international law the capability to do so. And understandably so, other countries would scramble their aircraft in response.”
The NORAD spokesperson said in an email that the U.S. sent the four Eielson-based F-16s to intercept the Russian aircraft and accompany them through the air defense ID zone. They were supported by three KC-135 tanker aircraft, one each from Eielson’s 168th Wing, Fairchild Air Force Base in Washington and McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas, as well as an E-8 AWACS electronic surveillance plane out of JBER.
According to the U.S. Naval Institute, the intercept occurred in airspace over neutral waters of the Bering and Chukchi seas along the west and northwest coasts of Alaska.
The last Russian sortie reported by NORAD was on Sept. 24, when the same kind of formation of two Bear bombers and two Flanker fighters transited the Alaska air defense ID zone. That was the last of several Russian incursions into the zone that occurred last summer, one of which included a joint formation of Russian and Chinese aircraft.
This article was originally published by KUAC reporter Tim Ellis.
Cover photo credit: A U.S. F-16 Fighting Falcon accompanies a Russian Tu-95 Bear bomber during a flight through the Alaska Air Defense Identification Zone in July. (KUAC file photo/DVIDS)