Russian Tu-142 maritime patrol aircraft makes unsafe approaches to HMS Prince of Wales carrier group in the Norwegian Sea

On 2 July 2026, a Russian Tupolev Tu-142 Bear F maritime patrol aircraft made repeated close approaches to the UK Carrier Strike Group led by the aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales over the Norwegian Sea, north-west of Norway. As reported by Reuters, the encounter took place while the carrier group was conducting NATO operations in the High North. Two F-35B Lightning jets launched from HMS Prince of Wales intercepted the aircraft and escorted it until it left the area.

According to Forces News, the Bear F flew close to the Royal Navy-led task group during flying operations that formed part of Operation Firecrest, dropping a large number of sonobuoys, the small underwater acoustic sensors used to detect submarines, while failing to respond to calls on international radio frequencies. The Ministry of Defence characterised the Russian activity as "unsafe and unprofessional." Britain made the encounter public on 6 July 2026.

The episode came during a period in which the Ministry of Defence has highlighted increasing Russian military activity in the High North and North Atlantic, with the carrier group deployed on NATO air policing tasks in the region.

This was overt Russian state military activity rather than a covert act, and attribution is not in doubt. The aircraft was openly identified as a Russian Tu-142 and the response followed standard NATO intercept practice. The characterisation of the conduct as "unsafe and unprofessional" is the British assessment. The sonobuoy drops close to the carrier are read by analysts as anti-submarine intelligence gathering, an attempt to gauge what undersea protection, if any, was screening the strike group. Russia had not published its own account of the encounter at the time of reporting. This record may change as further detail emerges.