Louis de Raguenel 12:21 p.m., March 30, 2022
Wednesday morning around 10:40 am, an Air Force Mirage 2000 was forced to take off to intercept a plane that had just been stolen in Italy.
The pilot, declaring himself of Slovak nationality, had just flown over the naval base of Toulon, in the Var.
This resulted in the temporary closure of Nice airspace.
NEWS EUROPE 1
Particularly vigilant in its mission of policing the sky with the context of the war in Ukraine, the Air Force was called upon this Wednesday morning around 10:40 a.m. for an astonishing mission.
A Mirage 2000 fighter jet took off from the Orange military base.
In flight, the French airmen forced the passenger plane to land urgently on the runway of the Aix-Les Milles aerodrome.
Overview of ultra-sensitive sites
A Fennec helicopter belonging to the operational permanence was also deployed in the landing phase of the aircraft.
Obeying the injunctions of the French soldiers, the pilot did not put up any resistance.
According to our information, it is a man without identity papers on him, declaring to have been born on September 19, 1988 in Slovakia.
And a detail: the man was in socks.
The plane was forced to land in an emergency because the pilot is suspected of having stolen the device in Italy, before entering French airspace and passing over several no-fly zones... highly sensitive sites such as the Toulon Naval Base, home port of French nuclear attack submarines and Nice-Côte d'Azur airport, which has led authorities to close the airspace above from Nice.
After the passenger plane landed, the Air Force soldiers handed the pilot over to the police.
The man was immediately taken into custody.
According to our information, he speaks English and gave the police a letter written in English.