Phil Noble / REUTERS
The foreign ministers of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania warned on Sunday that GPS jamming, which they blame on the Kremlin, was increasing the risk of a plane crash.
Jamming of GPS signals emanating from Russia has reached alarming levels in Europe, marking an unprecedented escalation, Finnish air carrier Finnair said on Monday, April 29. Since December 2023, Moscow has in fact been conducting a form of hybrid electronic warfare from its Kaliningrad enclave, located between Lithuania and Poland.
Finnair also announced on Monday that it had to divert two of its flights last week due to GPS interference preventing the approach to Tartu airport in Estonia. Although Finnair planes are equipped with alternative navigation systems, these incidents forced the company to suspend flights to Tartu until alternative solutions can be found.
The Estonian Foreign Minister denounced “Russian hybrid attacks”. “Russia knows perfectly well that the interference it causes is very dangerous for our aviation and goes against international conventions” which she signed, he added.
Extremely dangerous situation
Polish media reported in mid-January unprecedented GPS disruptions in the north and east of the country, including the capital Warsaw. This situation has also caused concern in Sweden, Finland and Estonia. Although Russia has not confirmed its involvement in this interference, it has mentioned holding exercises in Kaliningrad around the same time.
According to Russian information from mid-January, electronic warfare units of the Baltic Fleet conducted exercises aimed at protecting military installations from enemy drone attacks. The Borisoglebsk-2 electronic warfare vehicle, in service with the Russian army since 2015, is capable of jamming satellite communications and radio navigation devices.
The activation of this electronic warfare system in Kaliningrad had repercussions on neighboring countries, particularly on air traffic. British media The Sun indeed reported that this had an impact on “navigation systems that have become unusable, making planes unsure of their routes and having difficulty telling others where they are.” False data has also forced planes to change their trajectory and perform maneuvers to avoid non-existent obstacles, a situation described as extremely dangerous by industry sources cited by The Sun.
Thousands of flights disrupted
According to Financial Times , tens of thousands of civilian flights have been disrupted in recent months due to this interference. Since September 2023, “2,309 Ryanair flights and 1,368 Wizz Air planes recorded satellite navigation problems in the Baltic region“, as well as “82 British Airways flights, seven Jet2 flights, four EasyJet flights and seven operated by TUI», reveals the British media. Faced with this situation, Sweden requested NATO intervention.
The Baltic foreign ministers of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania also warned on Sunday April 28 in an interview with Financial Times that the GPS jamming, which they blame on the Kremlin, increased the risk of an air accident, although so far no fatal incidents have been reported as a result of these hostile Russian actions.
In March 2024, a plane carrying Grant Schapps, British Defense Secretary, was hit by a failure of its GPS system over Kaliningrad. According to data from the GPSJAM.org site, cited by the British newspaper The Guardianaround 46,000 flights from the United Kingdom have reported malfunctions in their GPS systems over the Baltic Sea since last August.