Spanish fighter jets hit the throttles and took to the skies over the Baltic Sea region during exercise Ramstein Alloy 2024.
An annual air policing exercise, Ramstein Alloy tests the ability of NATO’s air forces to safeguard the airspace over and around NATO Allies. For this year’s exercise, hosted by Estonia, Spanish Air Force EF-18 Hornet strike fighters took off from Šiauliai Air Base in Lithuania, where they are currently stationed on a Baltic Air Policing mission rotation. Overhead a Spanish Air Force A400M refueller gassed up Finnish and Spanish fighters.
Air policing is a peacetime activity conducted by NATO Allies 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, to ensure the integrity of Allied airspace. As part of air policing, fighters regularly scramble to investigate suspicious air contacts that fail to broadcast an identification code, or fail to respond to air traffic controller hails. Sometimes, these aircraft are commercial planes experiencing a communications malfunction; others are Russian military aircraft flying near NATO Allies in international airspace.
Footage includes shots of Spanish EF-18s launching a training scramble, and conducting mid-air refuelling with Finnish Air Force fighters, as well as an interview with a Spanish Air Force officer.
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