Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced that a projectile which impacted a field in eastern Poland on Thursday morning was likely a Russian missile. The object created a 10-meter wide crater near the village of Tarnawa Kolonia, situated roughly 100 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. This incident occurred during a broader Russian aerial assault on Lviv.
Tusk stated during an emergency meeting in Lublin that initial findings point toward a Russian Kh-101 ballistic missile. However, officials are working to confirm both the exact nature of the projectile and its point of origin. Andriy Sybiha, acting Foreign Minister of Ukraine, previously claimed the weapon was a Kh-101 cruise missile that violated NATO airspace.
While no injuries were reported, Polish authorities are treating the event with high priority. Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz confirmed that military assets, including an F-16 fighter jet, were deployed to monitor airspace after approximately 20 objects were detected overnight. Polish law enforcement located the impact site around 05:00, shortly after local residents reported hearing an explosion.
This event follows a history of Russian hardware encroaching on Polish territory since the start of the war in February 2022. Polish officials continue to conduct pyrotechnical analysis to finalize their investigation into the crash.
