Austria’s airspace left undefended on weekend as air force flight controllers were ‘on holiday’

Squadron of Eurofighters grounded while flight control staff on leave to compensate for overtime, defence ministry in Vienna admits

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Austria’s airspace was left undefended for several days last week owing to the country’s army running out of flight controllers to oversee its main airbase.
The Alpine country’s squadron of Eurofighters were grounded between Friday and Sunday while flight control staff took leave to compensate them for overtime, the defence ministry in Vienna has admitted.
Stationed at the Zeltweg military air base in the south of the country, the Eurofighters are the sole squadron tasked with intercepting threats to the country’s air space.
Austria’s defence minister appears to have been unaware of the gap in the country’s defences until being informed by the local press.
A the weekend Klaudia Tanner, Austria’s defence minister, said: “When I heard about this today, I immediately instructed the General Staff to find alternative solutions and implement them without delay to prevent this from happening again.”
Austrian fighter jets are scrambled to respond to about 50 potential threats every year, although these include commercial flights that have lost contact with ground control.
Crews at the airbase had been working overtime to cover for drastic staff shortages, according to Krone newspaper, but this was the first time that the country’s airspace had been left undefended over several days.
The country’s armed forces have blamed poor pay for the incident, saying that they cannot compete with civil airports which offer salaries up to two and a half times higher than the army wage.
Volker Reifenberger, the defence spokesman for the far-Right Freedom Party, said: “Any country, and terrorist organisation could have infiltrated our country without meeting any resistance.”
Austria has “permanent neutrality” enshrined in its constitution and is not a member of Nato. However, Vienna has been leaning towards deeper military cooperation with European neighbours since the Russian invasion of Ukraine three years ago.
In a move that caused domestic controversy, last year Vienna signed up to the European Sky Shield Initiative, a German-led air defence pact.
In April 2023, Austrian Eurofighters made international headlines when they scrambled to intercept an Israeli passenger jet that had lost contact with ground control.
Alarmed passengers shot footage of the jets flying next to them. The plane was on its way from Amsterdam to Tel Aviv and landed safely at its scheduled destination.
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