A huge American military transport aircraft Boeing C-17A Globemaster III landed at Burgas airport this Thursday, provoking a sharp public reaction and questions to the head of state and the government. The appearance of the strategic machine coincides with the discovery of several unmanned aerial vehicles in the Bulgarian Black Sea waters.
A position of citizens is spreading on social networks, asking questions about the flight operator, the type of cargo and the mission of the aircraft. In a post in the Facebook group "Spotted in Burgas®", author Dimitar Tashev directly addresses Prime Minister Rumen Radev, President Iliana Yotova, the Council of Ministers and the Ministry of Defense with a request for immediate information about what is happening on Bulgarian territory.
„National security is not managed with silence. While military planes land in Burgas and drones are being taken out of the Black Sea, Bulgarians deserve answers, not silence!“, writes Tashev.
The concerns of Burgas residents have been reinforced by the actions of the Navy in the last hours. On Wednesday, teams from the naval bases in Varna and Burgas carried out four separate operations to scout and recover unmanned aerial vehicles and their parts from the waters of the Black Sea, the Ministry of Defense reported.
The C-17 Globemaster III strategic transport aircraft is used primarily to transport troops, ammunition and heavy military equipment. Burgas Airport has a 3,200-meter runway, the complete reconstruction of which was completed in April this year, allowing it to accommodate some of the heaviest aircraft in the world.
The circulated position also draws attention to another recent flight of the same type of American military aircraft, which arrived at Moscow's Vnukovo Airport on August 25 after taking off from the Latvian capital Riga, according to official aviation radar data.