"There is definitely some kind of dome camera on it, possibly with thermal imaging capabilities, meaning that surveillance footage was likely transmitted to the team operating the device," said Eerik Purgel, head of the Border Guard Bureau at the Eastern Prefecture of the Police and Border Guard Board (PPA).

The AKV-05 aerostat is a surveillance system introduced by Russia's Ministry of Defense in 2018. The 50-cubic-meter helium-filled balloon is equipped with sensors, video cameras and thermal imaging cameras. All the collected data is transmitted to a ground-based control station or a vehicle to which the large balloon is tethered with cables.

"It was seen once near our Narva Reservoir, close to Kulgu Harbor, and another time further into Narva, near the Progress area. But when it was by the reservoir, we saw that it had a Z symbol on it," Purgel said.

In 2022, the Russian Ministry of Defense's propaganda channel, Zvezda, aired a report showing that the exact same type of aerostat was being used in the occupied Luhansk region of Ukraine.

"The Russian army is building up force protection systems. For example, a surveillance balloon hovers near the village, providing ultra-precise monitoring of everything within a 15-kilometer radius — even down to vehicle license plates. We track military equipment movements. At night, we use thermal cameras; during the day, we monitor the movement of people and vehicles. Another task is to track the movement of our convoys — now all attention is on technical support vehicles," said the Zvezda report.

However, fact-checking by "Impulss" found that the propaganda video exaggerated its claims. The aerostat can indeed monitor within a 15-kilometer radius, but its cameras can only distinguish vehicles and people up to eight kilometers away and read license plates within just one kilometer. This was not the only instance of the peculiar aircraft appearing in Russian state media. In the spring of last year, the state television channel Rossiya-1 aired a report explaining how aerostats were being used in Russian Karelia to monitor the Finnish border and detect border violators.

Beyond surveillance purposes, Russia also plans to deploy aerostats for infrastructure protection against drones, using a method reminiscent of World War I, when networks of suspended balloons were used to intercept bombers and missiles. Reports suggest that Russian aerostats were also employed in battles near the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria about a decade ago.

The reason behind Russia's use of the white aerostat at the Estonian border last year remains speculative. Former Estonian Air Force commander Jaak Tarien pointed out that the balloon appeared over the Narva River precisely when border crossing lines were exceptionally long.

"They were filming the crowds there — perhaps hoping for more dramatic footage, expecting unrest that could then be filmed and used for propaganda purposes," said Tarien, who now works as a program director at AS Cybernetica.

"The practical need is to film crowds gathering, but the added value is that it's visible and provocative. They are observing how we react — whether we do anything at all," Tarien explained.

However, Narva politician Mihhail Stalnuhhin offered a completely innocent explanation for the airborne object at the border.

"Just an ordinary weather balloon. These are used for taking measurements, determining wind speed... I don't know exactly what they measure — humidity and things like that. In the upper layers of the atmosphere," Stalnuhhin said.

Purgel countered that there are many other methods for measuring weather conditions. "From meteorological balloons to all sorts of other devices — there are numerous tools for this, and they already have them all. So, it's hard to believe such a claim."

Stalnuhhin's explanation closely resembles the narrative pushed by China's propaganda machine regarding the U.S. balloon incident. At the time, China's Foreign Ministry claimed that the balloon was an out-of-control weather monitoring device.

Tarien acknowledged that presenting a balloon as a weather device provides plausible deniability, as such balloons are difficult to control and can be carried by unpredictable air currents in high altitudes. "The question then is whether it genuinely went out of control and coincidentally ended up in a strategically interesting location or if this was planned and they can simply deny it. And it's very difficult to prove one way or the other."

In addition to aerostats, drones frequently fly along Estonia's eastern border, primarily for smuggling purposes. Eight years ago, a man in Pskov was caught building a drone for smuggling contraband cigarettes into Estonia. The first drone used for drug smuggling was intercepted by the PPA in 2021.

Meanwhile, in Lithuania, Belarusian smugglers have been using unmanned balloons on a massive scale. Last year alone, over 600 contraband-carrying balloons crossed into Lithuanian airspace, of which 70 were intercepted, according to the Lithuanian police and border guard service.

So, what can be done about unmanned aerial vehicles launched by neighboring Russia and spotted at the Estonian border or within its territory? While the aerostat observed at Estonia's border always remained over Russian territory and could not have been shot down by Estonian authorities, Purgel noted that shooting down aerial vehicles — even those over Estonian soil — is not necessarily a smart solution.

"We wouldn't want it to fall on a resident of Narva, for example. The real problem, though, is with drones. They are heavy and their weight varies significantly. But if one of those things drops from a hundred meters onto someone's head, it could be fatal," he explained.

This story was produced in collaboration with members of the European Broadcasting Union's investigative journalism network: LRT, YLE, VRT, SVT, LTV, CT, KRO-NCRV Pointer, RTVE and EBU.

--

Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!