Moscow’s four main airports were plunged into chaos this morning after officials closed runways in fear of alleged Ukrainian drone attacks.

The capital’s airspace was locked down early in the morning, forcing around 50 incoming flights to divert at the last minute while another 50 waiting to take off were grounded.

The move followed reports by the Russian Defence Ministry that a drone had been downed via electronic warfare in a rural area around 60 miles west of Vnukovo International Airport.

No flights were able to take off from or land at Vnukovo as well as Domodedovo, Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky airports, which together handle almost all the capital’s flight traffic.

Operations were close to resuming after two hours of disruption before a second

Pilots flying into the Russian capital were told to turn away before a second drone was shot down only 25 miles outside the capital, in the Istra District.

The editor-in-chief of state-owned propaganda outlet Russia Today, Margarita Simonyan, claimed the wreckage crashed on the street next to her house.

Posting a photo on Telegram of a plume of smoke over a residential area, she said there were ‘no casualties or destruction thanks to our air defence’.

Her account was contradicted by the district governor, Andrei Vorobyov, who said two people were injured and three houses suffered damage.

‘The man was hospitalised in a medical facility, the woman refused hospitalisation’, he wrote on Telegram.

No casualties were reported in connection with the felling of the first drone.

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