Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said that an object that crashed into a field in eastern Poland during the early hours of Thursday was “in all probability” an armed Russian cruise missile.
The object created a crater approximately 10 metres (33 feet) wide near the village of Tarnawa Kolonia, around 92 kilometres (57 miles) from Poland’s border with Ukraine. The incident occurred during a large-scale Russian assault targeting several Ukrainian cities, including Lviv, Kyiv and areas near Kryvyi Rih.
Speaking during a specially convened meeting in the eastern Polish city of Lublin, Tusk initially said that “all the indications” suggested the object was a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile that had entered Polish airspace.
After travelling to the crash site, the prime minister said military specialists had examined the debris and found that most of the recovered fragments pointed to the missile being a Russian Kh-101.
Although no deaths or injuries were reported in the incident, Tusk stressed that Polish authorities were treating the suspected airspace violation with the utmost seriousness.
He said there had been no immediate danger because the missile had landed in an unpopulated area. However, he added that Poland’s military had been prepared to shoot it down if it had continued further into the country.
NATO said it remained in close contact with Polish authorities following the incident. The alliance’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General Alexus G. Grynkewich, said NATO would continue taking all necessary measures to protect and defend its territory.
Polish Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said military forces had detected around 20 objects close to Polish airspace during the overnight Russian attack. Authorities were carrying out pyrotechnical and technical examinations of the fragments recovered from the crash site.
Ukraine’s acting Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha had earlier stated that a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crossed into Poland during Moscow’s large-scale attack on Ukraine, describing the incident as a violation of NATO airspace.
Tusk said he had been in contact with several European leaders. European Council President António Costa said Russia’s latest large-scale assault on Ukraine had once again demonstrated that Moscow’s aggression posed a wider threat to European security.
The suspected missile incursion came as Russian attacks caused extensive casualties across Ukraine. At least eight people were reported killed and dozens more injured. Six members of one family died in a village near Kryvyi Rih, while dozens of people were wounded in Lviv, a western Ukrainian city located close to the Polish border.
Poland has experienced several incidents involving Russian missiles and drones since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. A number of Russian drones and at least one unarmed Russian missile have previously entered or landed on Polish territory.
In November 2022, two Polish farmers were killed when a missile struck a village close to the Ukrainian border. Investigators later concluded that the missile was most likely fired by Ukrainian air defences while responding to a major Russian attack.
According to Poland’s military, the latest object was detected at approximately 03:40 local time on Thursday. An F-16 fighter jet was deployed to intercept it, but the object disappeared from military radar systems several minutes later. A military helicopter was subsequently sent to search the area.
Air raid sirens were activated in the Polish cities of Lublin and Krasnystaw as Russian forces carried out airstrikes across neighbouring Ukraine. Residents of Tarnawa Kolonia said they heard a powerful explosion at around 04:00, and police discovered the impact site roughly an hour later.
The incident occurred less than a day after Tusk met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Lublin. Zelensky had been returning from talks with US President Donald Trump when the two leaders held their meeting.
