Report says Russia used shadow ships to launch drones across Europe

Munich Airport shut down overnight on October 2-3, 2025 after multiple drone sightings. Shadow ships gave Russia a covert way to turn Europe’s commercial waterways into launch points for drones that repeatedly disrupted civilian aviation. The International Institute for Strategic Studies plotted 144 suspected drone sightings across Europe from 2024 to 2026, with incidents in Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Denmark and a sharp peak in late 2025.

In Spain, Alicante-Elche Airport suspended operations for nearly two hours on October 27, 2025 after a drone was seen near the perimeter, and Palma de Mallorca Airport later stopped flights for about an hour after another sighting. Copenhagen Airport also halted flights on September 22, 2025, prompting Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen to call it the “most serious attack on Danish critical infrastructure to date.”

Danish authorities later said they still had no evidence to prove what flew over Copenhagen Airport was a drone. Air Chief Marshal John Stringer, NATO’s deputy supreme allied commander in Europe, said each ally must decide how to respond and that many countries were taking the threat increasingly seriously, while stopping short of directly blaming Moscow. Russia has denied running a sabotage campaign.

The operation appeared designed to stay below the threshold that would trigger a collective NATO response while still testing how governments and militaries would react. The institute said Europe suffered a “strategic failure” because existing air defenses were not built for a threat in which low-flying drones can resemble birds or planes on radar, be launched close to borders and remain difficult to trace even when shot down.

The Associated Press tracked 145 sabotage and disruption incidents in Europe since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, cases Western officials blame on Moscow and say are meant to drain investigative resources and expose weak spots. In Poland, authorities said they would deploy up to 10,000 troops to protect critical infrastructure after sabotage incidents on the rail network.