Russian pilots who shot down a US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday received state awards from the Russian Ministry of Defense, Russian media reported.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu awarded state awards to the Su-27 pilots who shot down the MQ-9 Reaper drone in the Black Sea, for “preventing the unmanned aerial vehicle from violating the borders of the special operations zone,” reports the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.

The collision between a Russian Su-27 fighter jet and an American drone occurred approximately 40-50 nautical miles southwest of Crimea over the Black Sea in international airspace, the US Air Force said on Thursday.

Russia has accused the US of violating airspace it says it created for its “special military operation” in Ukraine – a definition the US does not accept. Officials also said that Russia had not reported such airspace restrictions.

• The US immediately sent a new drone on the way of the downed one – officials / Risks vs benefits

New footage released by the Pentagon on Thursday shows Russian fighter jets rapidly closing in on a drone, dumping fuel on it and appearing to damage the drone’s propeller.

The U.S. was forced to shoot down the drone over the Black Sea after the strike effectively rendered it inoperable, officials said.

The Ministry of Defense of Russia claims that the boundaries of the zone have been brought to the attention of all users of international airspace and published in accordance with international norms, writes TASS.

• The crash site of the American drone intercepted by Russian aircraft over the Black Sea – the US Army released a MAP

The United States believes that Russia has found the wreckage of a downed American surveillance drone in the Black Sea, a US official familiar with the situation told CNN.

The official described the debris found as either fiberglass fragments or small fragments of an MQ-9 Reaper drone.

Russia would recover the remains of the drone

CNN reported on Wednesday that Russia has reached the crash site of a US surveillance drone in the Black Sea, southwest of Crimea.

But the Biden administration downplayed the importance of the drone wreckage or the possibility of obtaining sensitive information from the wreckage.

“We’ve made it impossible for them to get anything of value from the remains of that drone, regardless of what remains may be on the surface of the water,” John Kirby, the National Security Council’s strategic communications coordinator, told CNN on Wednesday. .

After a US drone collided with Russian fighter jets on Tuesday morning, drone operators took steps to wipe the drone’s sensitive software before it crashed into the Black Sea, US officials said.

“All that’s left and is floating is probably the flight control surfaces, things like that. There’s probably nothing of real internal significance to them in terms of retooling or anything like that,” Kirby said.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said at a press conference on Wednesday that the drone had gone down into the sea in a place where the water could be nearly a mile deep.

The Russian plane caused the crash of the American MQ-9 Reaper drone

It will be recalled that a Russian fighter jet caused the crash of a US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday. The Reaper drone and two SU-27 Flanker aircraft operated over international waters over the Black Sea.

The US European Command said two Russian Su-27 fighter jets conducted an “unsafe and unprofessional interception” of a US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone operating in international airspace over the Black Sea.

• “Around 07:03, one of the Russian Su-27 aircraft hit the MQ-9’s propeller, resulting in the downing of the MQ-9 by US forces in international waters.
• “Several times before the collision, the Su-27 jettisoned fuel and flew in front of the MQ-9 in a careless and unprofessional manner,” the source said.

Russia has rejected U.S. accusations that its planes acted recklessly in Tuesday’s incident over the Black Sea and said the drone was flying near Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, on its way to territory claimed by Russia. Russia also claimed that the drone made a “sudden maneuver” that caused it to crash, insisting that there was no contact between the aircraft and the drone.

• Why the Pentagon declassified the image of a drone shot down in the Black Sea: “This is clear and convincing evidence”

The first images of the interception of an American drone by Russian aircraft

On Thursday, the US military released images of Russian jets that intercepted a Reaper drone over the Black Sea two days ago, causing the plane to crash.

The roughly 40-second video, declassified by the Pentagon, was edited by the US military for length, but shows events in chronological order, the Pentagon said.

The footage shows a Sukhoi 27 jet approaching and passing the MQ-9 drone, leaving two jets of fuel.

Then the same plane or a pair of them perform the same maneuver and come even closer to the US surveillance drone, after which the image transmission is interrupted, possibly due to physical contact between the planes.

The final footage shows one of the propeller blades bent, suggesting that the Americans were right when they said there was contact between the Su-27 and the Reaper, and the Russians lied when they said their aircraft did not touch the drone.

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