More unidentified drones were spotted in Europe on Thursday night, disrupting flight services at Germany’s second largest airport, in Munich. Belgian defense officials are also investigating sightings of multiple drones over a military base in the east of the country overnight.
Munich airport reopened Friday morning after the drone sightings prompted officials to temporarily close the facility and suspend 17 flights overnight.
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A spokesperson for the German airline Lufthansa told CBS News on Friday that flight operations “resumed as scheduled early in the morning,” adding that Lufthansa regretted any inconvenience to passengers.
Munich airport said Friday that the flight disruptions had impacted nearly 3,000 passengers, but that those affected had been rebooked on new flights or had their flights rescheduled.
“When a drone is sighted, the safety of travelers is the top priority,” the airport said in a statement, noting that “reporting chains between air traffic control, the airport, and police authorities have been established for years.”
The airport said flights were suspended at 10:18 p.m. local time Thursday (4:18 pm ET) following the drone sightings.
On Thursday, local media outlets in Belgium reported that unidentified drones had been spotted over the German city of Düren, about 20 miles from the German-Belgian border, at about 1:45 a.m. local time after flying over the Elsenborn military base in eastern Belgium, which is also close to the border.
Belgium’s VRT NWS news outlet reported Friday that German police in Düren had identified 15 different drones in the area.
There was no immediate response from federal police authorities in Germany or the local police in Düren about the drone activity to a request for information from CBS News.
A Belgian official familiar with the matter confirmed to CBS News on Friday that drones had been sighted over Elsenborn military base, but said that the number of drones was still under investigation.
Belgium is a member of the U.S.-led NATO military alliance but the source told CBS News that only Belgian forces are stationed at the Elsenborn base.
A spokesperson for the Belgian Defense Ministry told CBS News on Friday that defense officials were “currently examining this matter.”
Authorities have not identified where the drones came from, but it was the latest in a series of similar unexplained drone sightings near airports and military installations in Western Europe over the past month. But there is widespread suspicion in European capitals that Russia is behind these drone flights, and that it is seeking to probe NATO’s security posture.
After repeated incursions into Danish airspace, including around military bases and airports in recent weeks, European leaders met in Copenhagen earlier this week to discuss boosting European air defenses. The summit also came after Russian military aircraft violated NATO airspace in Poland, Romania and Estonia in recent weeks, and amid Russia’s ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
“We meet at a time when Russia has intensified their attacks in Ukraine, where we have seen Russian airspace violations and unwanted drone activity in several European countries,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told reporters after the summit on Wednesday.
“From a European perspective there is only one country… willing to threaten us, and that is Russia, and therefore we need a very strong answer back,” said Frederiksen.
