German authorities have begun a counterterrorism investigation into a drone laden with explosives found near a Ukrainian transport plane at Leipzig Airport. It is seen as a "hybrid attack scenario."
German airports have seen hundreds of drone alerts, but this incident eclipses them all: in the middle of the night on Wednesday, airport staff at the Leipzig/Halle Airport in the eastern state of Saxony found a drone rigged with explosives on the runway.
Federal police specialists were able to defuse it using a bomb disposal robot. The incident prompted the closure of part of one of Europe's largest cargo hubs.
German media reports say that experts from Saxony state police found the package to contain the highly explosive substances PETN and Semtex, which are also used in military applications. The detonator attached to the package had apparently broken off, which prevented an explosion.
This unconfirmed information is particularly significant because the drone was found next to a plane of the Ukrainian state-owned carrier Antonov Airlines. The aircraft was reportedly loaded with military munitions that — according to reports — had just been transported from France to Leipzig and were slated for onward shipment to Ukraine.
