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Tehran 29 April _A routine encounter between British Fighter jets and two long-range Russian reconnaissance aircraft has elicited an unprecedented reaction from the head of the Royal Air Force (RAF).
TEHRAN, Young Journalists Club(YJC)_According to the RAF, Typhoon fighter jets were scrambled from RAF Lossiemouth (situated in north-east Scotland) to monitor two Russian Tupolev Tu-142s, which are long-range maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare aircraft.
It is noteworthy that the RAF statement only mentions that the Russian aircraft were in the UK’s “area of interest”, which essentially means the Tu-142s were well outside British airspace.
Air Chief Marshal, Mike Wigston, mocked the Russian aircraft as “relics of the Cold War” which pose a “hazard to civilian and military aircraft”.
The commander of the RAF added: “Despite the global [coronavirus] pandemic, the Royal Air Force and our allies continue to ensure Russian military flights pose no threat to NATO and UK airspace”.
This is believed to be the first time the head of the RAF has launched a verbal assault on the Russian air force after a routine – indeed standard – encounter.
Indeed, a similar encounter occurred in early March when the RAF scrambled six Typhoon fighter jets from RAF Lossiemouth to intercept at least two Tupolev TU-95 long-range strategic bombers.
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