The Iraqi army announced that it shot down a Turkish UCAV over Kirkuk. “A Turkish UCAV that infiltrated Iraqi airspace has been shot down,” said General Abdulsalam Ramadan, deputy commander of the Iraqi army’s air force in Kirkuk. Ramadan said the UCAV was coming from the direction of Sulaymaniyah, the second largest city in Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government.
The downed UCAV damaged a house in the city center, police and army sources told AFP. While there were no direct injuries, a carpenter working at a nearby construction site fell to the ground and was taken to hospital. Sources told Reuters that fires broke out in some houses and firefighters extinguished the flames.
The New Arab website also reported that the UCAV landed in the garden of a house near a market adjacent to the crowded Airport Street.
Iraqi media reported that the downed UCAV was Aksungur. Accordingly, the UCAV was shot down by four anti-aircraft missiles fired by Iraqi air defense systems.