Cathay Pacific A350 Triggers NATO Alert Over Hungary, Fighter Jets Deployed

A Cathay Pacific jet operating a long haul flight was intercepted by fighter jets over Hungary, and there are more questions than answers as of now as to how the plane “lost contact” with air traffic control.

Cathay Pacific plane doesn’t contact ATC, gets intercepted

This incident happened on July 4, 2026, and involves Cathay Pacific flight CX257, operating from Hong Kong (HKG) to London Heathrow (LHR). The flight was operated by an Airbus A350-1000 with the registration code B-LXA.

The 5,994-mile flight operated the standard flight path, and the flight was in the air for 13hr40min. However, that doesn’t mean it was a routine flight, as the plane was intercepted by NATO fighter jets over Hungary. Here’s how Hungarian Defense Minister Romulusz Ruszin-Szendi described what happened on Facebook:

Today at 13:42 an alarm was ordered for NATO QRA(I) standby aircraft pair, because an A350 Chinese Aircraft flying on the Hong Kong-London route (still in Romanian airspace) failed to contact the Romanian Civil Air Control. The Hungarian squad took off at 13:51 and at the Hungarian border, the Chinese aircraft with a visual warning, which then contacted the air control. The task is over, the stand-by aircraft returned to its base in Kecskemét. Thank you to the guardians!

As you can see, the “Chinese Aircraft” reportedly didn’t make contact with air traffic control in Hungary, and nine minutes after an alarm was ordered, fighter jets took off to intercept the aircraft. After approaching the plane and making a “visual warning,” the plane contacted air traffic control, and continued as planned.

Hong Kong’s Civil Aviation Department has expressed “serious concern” over the incident, while Cathay Pacific has referred to this as a “temporary loss of communication,” and there was a “subsequent interception by the authorities in accordance with internationally recognised protocols.”

The airline also went on to clarify that “the flight adhered to its authorised routing at all times, and at no point was the safety of the aircraft or those on board compromised,” and “the crew reported the occurrence immediately, and it remains under investigation at this time.”

What could’ve caused this communication issue?

What’s odd here is that it doesn’t sound like there was actually an issue with the aircraft’s communication system, in the sense that communications were restored after visual contact was made with the fighter jets. So something might’ve been malfunctioning, but it wasn’t a case of the communication system simply being broken.

Sometimes pilots will forget to switch frequencies, or will accidentally switch to the wrong frequency. However, that doesn’t typically prompt a fighter jet response. For example, if pilots simply forgot to switch frequencies, you’d think the air traffic controllers expecting to hear from the Cathay Pacific plane would check with that frequency. Meanwhile if the pilots switched to the wrong frequency and didn’t get a response, you’d think they’d go back to their previous frequency, to figure out what was going on.

I’m not saying this is the case, but one wonders if this might’ve been a situation where both pilots at the controls were asleep briefly? A Hong Kong to London flight has four pilots, and the idea is that two pilots are at the controls and two are resting at cruise altitude. However, on long haul flights it’s also not unusual to have controlled rest in the flight deck, where one person dozes off.

Sometimes — though very rarely — both people end up accidentally falling asleep. For example, in 2022, we saw both pilots on a transatlantic ITA Airways flight fall asleep, and just months later, we saw both pilots on an Ethiopian Airlines flight fall asleep, causing them to overfly the runway at cruising altitude, and have the autopilot disengage.

Now, in terms of circumstances, this wouldn’t fit the typical profile of a flight where both pilots fall asleep. While it was a long haul flight, it was light outside the entire way, the pilots would’ve had some rest at this point in the flight, and it was a morning departure, so they should’ve boarded pretty well rested. But still, that theory seems more likely than anything else I can come up with. It’ll be interesting to see what an investigation reveals.

Bottom line

A Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 triggered a NATO alert over Hungary, when the plane reportedly lost contact with air traffic control for an extended period of time. Fighter jets were deployed to fly up next to the aircraft, and at that point, communication was restored.

This incident is now being investigation, as the circumstances surrounding it are very strange. It doesn’t sound like there were any bad intentions here, but what kind of a malfunction could this have been, or was this a case of the pilots just being asleep at the wheel… er, joystick?

What do you make of this Cathay Pacific fighter jet situation?