A Cessna 172 took off without authorization from Kalocsa airfield on the morning of August 29, 2026. A few minutes later, the Hungarian military radar detected something no one expected: the aircraft was heading straight toward the restricted area of the Paks Nuclear Power Plant, the facility that generates nearly half of Hungary’s electricity.
The authorities did not hesitate. Two Gripen fighter jets took off to intercept the intruder while tension mounted on the ground. The pilot, a 24-year-old man, never got close enough to cause any damage: the plane ended up crashing in a sunflower field about four miles from the plant.
What followed was almost as strange as the flight itself. The man got out of the plane, walked to a nearby road and tried to get into the car of a driver who had stopped to help him. The police arrived minutes later and arrested him at the scene. Tests confirmed what had already been suspected: he was intoxicated. The nuclear plant suffered no damage.