At 00:30 local time (22:30 UTC on 30 March) on Tuesday, 31 March 2026, Estonia activated its EE-ALARM public warning system for Lääne-Viru and Ida-Viru counties after the Estonian Defence Forces (EDF) reported potential drone sightings over eastern Estonia. By approximately 00:45 local time the alert expanded to five additional counties: Jõgeva, Põlva, Tartu, Valga, and Võru, covering a broad sweep of eastern and southern Estonia. A Finnair Helsinki-Tartu service turned back over central Estonia during the alert window. Authorities declared the threat over by 06:00 local time (03:00 UTC) on 31 March.
The event produced no confirmed drone crash on Estonian soil. It was the second drone air-threat alert in Estonia in less than a week, following the Auvere power station strike on 25 March 2026.
What Estonian authorities reported
The EDF stated that it had detected "potential air threats" and was tracking possible drone sightings over eastern Estonia. Authorities issued the initial EE-ALARM for Lääne-Viru and Ida-Viru counties at approximately 00:30 local time, then extended coverage to Jõgeva, Põlva, Tartu, Valga, and Võru counties roughly fifteen minutes later. The expansion brought the total to seven counties, reflecting uncertainty about the objects' tracks and the precautionary logic that governed the March series of alerts.
No drone wreckage or confirmed crash site on Estonian territory was reported during or after the alert. The absence of physical evidence distinguished this event from the 25 March Auvere strike, where a drone struck the power station chimney and was destroyed on impact. The EDF made no public statement identifying a specific drone type or confirmed trajectory.
Aviation impact
A Finnair flight operating the Helsinki-Tartu route turned back over central Estonia and returned to Helsinki-Vantaa Airport during the alert window. The return service, the Tartu-Helsinki departure, was cancelled as a result. At least one departing Tallinn flight was also disrupted by the overnight alert.
The aviation disruptions marked the second time in six days that drone activity over Estonian airspace had affected commercial flights. The recurrence reinforced pressure on Estonian authorities and EASA to establish clearer protocols for airspace management during Baltic drone-threat episodes.
Context: same Ukrainian strike wave that hit Estonia on 25 March
The overnight alert coincided with a Ukrainian mass-strike campaign against northwestern Russia, targeting St. Petersburg-area infrastructure. Ukrainian forces were striking Baltic oil export terminals at Primorsk and Ust-Luga with long-range drones in this period. Russian electronic warfare assets along the Baltic coastline, deploying GPS jamming and spoofing, repeatedly pushed Ukrainian drones off their programmed routes during these raids. Corrupted navigation then carried some objects toward Baltic NATO territory rather than the intended Russian targets.
This same pattern had produced the Auvere power station strike on 25 March 2026, six days earlier, and the Varėna district drone crash in Lithuania on 23 March 2026. The 31 March alert was consistent with stray drones from the same recurring source: Ukrainian platforms targeting Russian Baltic oil infrastructure, deflected by Russian EW into Estonian airspace.
Wind layer — regional weather context
The objects tracked during this alert were, or were likely to have been, powered GPS-guided military platforms rather than wind-drifted objects. The wind layer on the map provides regional weather context for the alert window and the upper-air conditions over eastern Estonia at the time. It cannot reconstruct release points or intended targets the way the wind layer can for a balloon or unpowered object. The wind model and its documented limits are described on the methodology page.