Drudge Retort: The Other Side of the News
Wednesday, August 19, 2026

Aware of a USAF C-17 Globemaster III flight heading to Antarctica, Russia's civil aviation authority warned New Zealand's Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) about "potentially hazardous" space activity, who then issued a NOTAM (Notice to Airmen), forcing the USAF crew to return unharmed to Christchurch, NZ.

RFI to NZ CAA

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"The NZ CAA said it was made aware by the Russian air traffic agency of a planned missile launch and "associated potential hazard to international airspace, within New Zealand's Oceanic Flight Information Region (FIR)," a 30-million-square-km area which is one of the largest airspaces in the world."

~snip~

So, the DOD, USAF, NASA, DTRA, the USIC, and the FAA didn't know about this Russian missile test, forcing the Russian civil aviation to warn the NZ CAA to warn the USAF C-17 crew heading to Antarctica.

#1 | Posted by C0RI0LANUS at 2026-08-19 04:07 AM | Reply

Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters stated that the initial Russian notifications regarding the event were highly ambiguous. Former Defence Minister Wayne Mapp suggested the "missile launch" warning could potentially relate to a controlled re-entry or de-orbiting of an old Russian satellite into the South Pacific "spacecraft cemetery" (Point Nemo), rather than a surface military test.

They don't even know if there was an actual missile launch.

#2 | Posted by sitzkrieg at 2026-08-19 07:51 AM | Reply

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