Yesterday an interesting photo was taken (20 North of Chania airport from an altitude of 20000 ft) by a pilot (Mike Mavrideros) from a civilian aircraft flying north of Crete.
The photo shows a Russian military vessel underway about 20 nautical miles north of Souda Bay heading 090.
It’s supposed to be a Russian Navy Udaloy class destroyer. There are currently two Udaloy-class destroyer vessels in the area: Admiral Tributs (part of SAG Varyag and until a few days ago sailing in the Ionian Sea) and Vice-Admiral Kulakov (part of SAG Ustinov and until a few days ago sailing south of Crete).
This evidence is interesting for two reasons, the first is precisely its position, very close to the Souda naval base, the most important NATO port of call in the eastern Mediterranean, and the second is the fact that it is sailing in the southern Aegean, an area where, until now, we had not tracked any Russian naval units.