Two Men Come Forward After a Car Broke Through Leipzig/Halle Airport’s Fence

The car that broke through the perimeter fence at Leipzig/Halle Airport on the night of October 17, 2026, has been found, and the two men linked to it have come forward through their lawyers. The 20-year-old driver says he lost control of the car near the airport, according to Leipzig police.

The breach shut the airport’s north runway overnight and set off a search of the airfield. It came barely two months after a drone carrying explosives was found at the same airport.

What happened at the fence

Damage to a fence on the airport boundary was found shortly before 11 p.m. on Saturday, October 17, the Polizeidirektion Leipzig said in a release at 2:14 a.m. It called the event a security-relevant incident.

Flights on the north side stopped and the north runway closed, while the south runway stayed in use. At that point police could not say whether anyone unauthorized was on the airport grounds.

Federal Police (Bundespolizei) and Saxony state police searched the site overnight. By 7 a.m. on Sunday they had found no intruders and no suspicious objects, and investigators judged that a vehicle had most likely broken through the fence. The north runway was still closed at that hour.

Airport spokesperson Uwe Schuhart said passenger and cargo flights ran without restrictions because the second runway was open, as dpa reported. He said the damaged section runs along a public road, beside an emergency access point for fire crews, and that the fence itself was hit, not the emergency gate.

No camera recorded that stretch of fence, Schuhart added. The one camera there is used for operations and stores no footage.

A driver, an owner and an Audi

On Sunday evening two lawyers brought their clients to the Leipzig public prosecutor’s office and the police, according to a police release on October 19. The two Syrian men, aged 20 and 32, identified themselves as the driver and the registered keeper of an Audi.

Through his lawyer, the 20-year-old said he lost control of the car near the airport and broke through the fence. He then left the scene, and the car was later towed away privately. Police say he holds no valid driving license.

The 32-year-old made no statement. Officers found the Audi on the premises of a car dealer after a judge ordered it seized and searched.

Swiss broadcaster SRF reported, citing dpa and security sources, that the men said they had been practicing for a driving test. The police release does not mention that.

The driver is under investigation for leaving the scene of an accident and driving without a license. The keeper is being investigated for allegedly letting an unlicensed driver use his car. Police say the exact sequence of events, each man’s role and any motive are still being examined “in all directions.”

Why a broken fence drew a full search

Leipzig/Halle Airport is not an ordinary regional field. Three Russian Antonov An-124 freighters belonging to Volga-Dnepr have been stuck there since the EU closed its airspace to Russian aircraft on February 28, 2022, as United24 reported in 2025, citing Germany’s transport ministry.

Police first described the breach as near those jets, then put the distance at about 1.2 miles (2 km), while saying they could not pin it down. Schuhart said the jets and the damaged fence are both in the airport’s northern area, but not next to each other.

Ukrainian Antonov freighters are based in the southern area, much farther from the fence, dpa reported. The drone found in early August was near Ukrainian cargo aircraft, and the German government has since blamed it on Russia, a charge Moscow rejects.

On September 1, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said police inquiries, the method of attack and intelligence together showed Russian responsibility, according to Euronews. Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said Russia’s consulate general in Bonn would close on September 18.

That history explains the response to a hole in a fence. After the August drone scare, police could not assume a breach was harmless, so the north side was shut while the airfield was searched.