A marine drone of the type used in the war in neighboring Ukraine self-detonated on Friday in Romania’s Black Sea port of Constanta near an oil terminal, without causing any casualties, the Defense Ministry said.
The port was being evacuated, residents along Romania’s Black Sea coast were warned to take cover, and two helicopters were surveying the area for any further drones, Deputy Interior Minister Raed Arafat said.
“We now know there is the risk of self-detonation, we have … evacuated in case there are more drones,” Arafat said. “We are not panicking, the measures are purely preventative.”
The explosion comes a week after a Russian drone crashed into an apartment building in the southeastern Romanian city of Galati, near the border with Ukraine, injuring two people – the first time in the Russia-Ukraine war that a drone struck a densely populated area in a NATO state.
Romania, a NATO and European Union member, shares a 650-km (400-mile) border with Ukraine and has reported 28 incursions into its airspace by Russian drones since Moscow began attacking Ukrainian ports on the Danube, the Defense Ministry has said.
