New air policing deployments to Bulgaria and Romania
November 2022
On October 20th, 2022, Bulgarian Defense Minister Mr. Dimitar Stoyanov confirmed that the Spanish Ministry of Defense had announced a new deployment to reinforce the Air Policing missions of the Bulgarian Air Force, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This deployment, as part of NATO’s Enhanced Air Policing (EAP) mission on the Black Sea Region, will be the second time that Spain has sent fighters to Bulgaria. The first one being early this year – February 11th to March 31st, 2022, with the deployment of the Strela Detachment to the Graf Ignatievo Air Force Base.
The new deployment, comprised of 6 Eurofighter Typhoon (F-2000) and 150 troops, belong to the Ala 11 of the Spanish Air Force, with homebase in Morón de la Frontera (Seville). Asides from the air policing and surveillance missions in Bulgarian airspace, supporting the MiG-29 crews of the Bulgarian Air Force, this new Spanish Air Force detachment has been deployed under the command of the NATO Integrated Air and Missile Defense System (NATO-INADS), carrying out different tasks reported at the Standing Air and Missile Defense Plan.