Rzeczpospolita: F-16 Fired Missile at House in Poland

During the downing of a Russian drone in the skies over Poland, one of the AIM-120 air-to-air missiles fired hit a residential building.

This is reported by the Polish publication Rzeczpospolita, citing its own sources.

On the night of September 10, a 160-kilogram aircraft missile hit a house in the village of Wyryky Wola, partially destroying the roof and breaking through the ceiling, but there were no casualties.

“It was an AIM-120 AMRAAM air-to-air missile from our F-16, which malfunctioned during the flight and did not find its target. Fortunately, it did not explode because the detonator fuses worked,” one of the sources said.

Rzeczpospolita accuses the Lublin prosecutor’s office of concealing information about the “unidentified flying object” that destroyed the house. The Ministry of National Defense also did not give a public assessment of the incident.

After the inspection, the Lublin Prosecutor’s Office identified the debris of 17 Russian drones, but it refused to comment on the object in Wyryki, Rzeczpospolita journalists say.

“At present, the object has not been identified as a drone or as its fragments,” the laconic statement reads.

It is known that Dutch F-35s and Polish F-16s, which use these missiles, were involved in intercepting Russian drones in Polish airspace. Their wreckage was also found by local residents the day after the invasion.

It is worth noting that the AIM-120 is a medium-range missile, the latest modifications of which can fly over 120 kilometers. They are launched from relatively long distances, so the version with the target disappearing from the radar, which led to a deviation from the course, cannot be ruled out.

If the target is lost, the missile continues to fly in its direction. If the missile’s own on-board homing radar head does not find the target, the flight continues until it runs out of fuel or self-destructs, depending on the pilot’s decision.

It can be assumed that the self-destruct mechanism failed, the missile continued to move and fell on the house, causing damage only through kinetic impact.

A similar incident recently occurred with a Ukrainian fighter jet, from which an aerial munition fell and destroyed a house in Volyn.