A Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace during the massive strike on Ukraine overnight into July 30, said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha. The Polish military confirmed that it had detected an unidentified object in the country’s airspace and scrambled an F-16 fighter jet to intercept it. However, Poland has not yet established whether the object was a Russian missile.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also confirmed the violation of the country’s airspace, saying he has convened a coordination group that includes the defense minister and representatives of the relevant services, who are working at the scene and regularly briefing him on all established details.
According to data from the Operational Command of the Polish Armed Forces, the westward-moving object was detected at 3:40 a.m. Six minutes later, it disappeared from radar screens — before it could be positively identified. An Mi-24 helicopter was dispatched to the area to investigate; its crew located the likely crash site near the village of Tarnawa-Kolonia in Lublin Voivodeship.
As reported by Polish news agency PAP, after 5:00 a.m. police discovered a crater roughly 10 meters in diameter, along with scattered fragments of an unidentified object, located between the villages of Tarnawa-Kolonia and Tokary. The crater is located in a field approximately 1.5–2 kilometers from the nearest homes. The area has been cordoned off, and the military and other Polish services are working to determine the origin of the debris. Police counterterrorism officers were also dispatched to the site. The military police, Internal Security Agency, Military Counterintelligence Service, and Lublin prosecutor’s office were all notified.
No one was injured in the incident, and there is currently no threat to the lives or property of local residents, police spokesperson Andrzej Fiolek said. Residents of nearby villages said the explosion was so powerful that windows in their homes shook.
Sybiha maintains that it was specifically a Russian Kh-101 missile involved in the attack on Ukraine that crossed into Polish territory. According to the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, the incident represents yet another violation of NATO airspace and underscores the need to strengthen Ukraine’s air defenses.
Even before the unidentified object was detected, Poland scrambled military aircraft in response to activity by Russian long-range aviation and the massive strike on Ukraine, tracking at least a dozen missiles over the western regions of Ukraine. One of these other objects came within around 5 kilometers of the Polish border before turning east. Air raid sirens were sounded in Lublin, Krasnystaw, and other areas of Lublin Voivodeship.
Overnight into July 30, Russia fired 74 missiles and 284 drones of various types at Ukraine. According to Ukrainian authorities, as of the time of publication at least eight people were killed, including three children, and dozens were injured. The strikes hit the Dnipropetrovsk, Lviv, Kyiv, Poltava, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Sumy, Vinnytsia, Cherkasy, and Ivano-Frankivsk regions.
