The scramble alarm was launched by the NATO Air Operations Command and Control Center (CAOC) based in Uedem in Germany: the aircraft, belonging to the Russian Federation, was traveling off the coasts of the Baltic countries without a flight plan or radio contact with traffic authorities.
The Scramble alarm, triggered at the TFA redeployment, is the operational activity consisting in quickly activating a pair of interceptor aircraft in order to reach and identify one or more unknown aircraft that violate the skies of the Alliance in order to ensure its safety. In a few minutes the pilots of the Air Force intercepted and identified the military aircraft, according to the procedures established by NATO.
The Italian Eurofighter are doing this service on Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia, from the 1 January 2015 according to the shifts and the modalities established by NATO.
To date, Italy is the only NATO nation that has ensured Interim Air Policing activities in all 4 areas of the Alliance that have requested it (Slovenia, Albania, Iceland and the Baltic Republics). The Italian pilots located at the Šiauliai base were the first and for now the only ones to obtain the maximum efficiency result at the end of an inspection visit aimed at assessing the efficiency of the forces deployed within the Baltic Air Policing mission. This is the first time since the mission carried out in the area of responsibility of the NATO Allied Command Operation (ACO) in Brussels (Belgium) was established.
Source: Šiauliai, Lithuania - chap. Andrea Lanzilli
