Lithuania's capital airport was closed overnight due to weather balloons from Belarus — Delfi
The state-owned company "Lithuanian Airports" officially announced the temporary closure of Vilnius International Airport on the night of Sunday, June 7, 2026.
Airport management made this emergency decision after detecting unidentified objects in the Baltic country’s sovereign airspace.
The airport administration called this incident yet another deliberate provocation by a neighboring state, which directly threatens the safety of civilian passenger transport.
Emergency safety measures were initiated in the middle of the night after receiving data from radar surveillance and air traffic control services.
As noted by the company’s press service, at 1:18 a.m., “partial restrictions were imposed over Vilnius Airport in connection with a hybrid attack by Belarus against Lithuania, civil aviation, and society.”
The main cause for alarm was the appearance of suspicious aircraft on critical flight paths.
Air defense specialists and air traffic controllers detected specific signals in the sky that threatened the safe flight paths of passenger aircraft.
Signatures characteristic of weather sondes were detected in areas posing a risk to aviation.
Such devices are usually launched from Belarusian territory and lack a transponder system, making them invisible to standard aircraft navigation systems.
The air alert and airspace closure directly affected international flight schedules and the plans of many travelers.
According to official data, the temporary restrictions affected 5 routes and 453 passengers: 4 flights were diverted to other airports (2 of them to Kaunas), and one flight was canceled.
Airport staff and airline representatives worked to minimize inconvenience for passengers by providing logistical assistance.
This was reported by Delfi.
Weather balloons carrying contraband flew into Poland
In the Podlaskie Voivodeship, Polish law enforcement officers discovered five weather balloons, each with packages of contraband cigarettes attached.
Recently, Lithuanian border guards recorded another attempt to illegally transport excise goods across the border with Belarus using weather balloons. During operations in the Šalčininkai, Ignalina, and Varėna districts, weather balloons were discovered carrying a total of 13,500 packs of cigarettes.
