Fire near Sofia: 11 Starlink antennas torched, lawmaker slams security agency
Two masked men set fire to 11 of 17 antennas at a satellite ground station near Sofia, lawmaker Ivaylo Mirchev says. There has been no official confirmation so far.
Symbolic image · Photo: Rainer Lippert / Wikimedia Commons, Public domain (cropped and resized)
Ivaylo Mirchev, co-chair of Yes, Bulgaria and a lawmaker for Democratic Bulgaria, said on Monday (Oct. 12) that 11 antennas used to communicate with SpaceX's Starlink satellite system had been deliberately set on fire at a site near Sofia. According to his Facebook post, two masked men set fire to 11 of the 17 antennas. Mirchev said the satellites are also used in the war in Ukraine. BTA reported that there was initially no confirmation from the DANS security agency, the Interior Ministry or SpaceX.
According to research by the news site Dir.bg, the site is Teleport Plana, a commercial satellite ground station owned by a major telecoms operator at an altitude of about 1,100 meters – not a state or military facility. Footage from a round-the-clock livestream shows the fire broke out at around 10:18 p.m. on Oct. 9, the site said. The station also provides internet to Bulgaria's Antarctic base on Livingston Island.
Mirchev accused DANS of failing: only days earlier, he said, the agency's chief had assured the Consultative Council for National Security that counterintelligence was actively countering Russia-linked sabotage. He asked whether partner services had issued a warning. Together with fellow lawmaker Bozhidar Bozhanov, he submitted parliamentary questions to DANS and the Interior Ministry.