Chinese Spy Plane Detected Flying Into Pacific

This photograph released by the Joint Staff of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces shows a Chinese navy Y-9 electronic intelligence gathering aircraft on March 27 during a sortie in the Western Pacific.

A Chinese intelligence plane’s long-range flight has been tracked in the Western Pacific—the second such sortie this month—on a map released on Wednesday by U.S. treaty ally Japan.

An accompanying photograph, taken from an interceptor fighter jet of Japan’s Air Self-Defense Forces, showed the distinct airframe of the electronic intelligence-gathering plane known as a Y-9JB or GX-8, which is in service with China’s naval air force.

This class of spy plane, like the family of Boeing RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft used by the U.S. Air Force, specializes in the collection, analysis and cataloguing of various electronic signals, such as those produced by radars, guided missiles and air defense systems, among other types of military hardware.

The data is critical to the planning of offensive and defensive actions against potential adversaries, including the effective use of electronic warfare against an opponent or deploying electronic countermeasures.

Newsweek’s graphic, built using data from the Joint Staff of Japan’s Defense Ministry, shows the Chinese navy intelligence plane performing a circular patrol in the East China Sea before entering the Philippine Sea via the Miyako Strait, between the Japanese islands of Miyako and Okinawa.

The aircraft flew along Japan’s southwestern islands toward Taiwan, which said it detected one Chinese military plane operating off its east coast from 10:24-10:31 a.m. local time on Wednesday.

The Defense Ministry in Taipei did not disclose the aircraft type, but said it briefly reached 118 nautical miles off Cape Eluanbi, the island’s southernmost point. It was among 14 Chinese warplanes detected in the northern, southwestern and southeastern sectors of Taiwan’s air defense zone, according to

The Y-9, an upgrade from the Y-8 airframe of Soviet design, is manufactured by China’s state-owned Shaanxi Aircraft Corp. as a medium military transport plane.

The Y-9JB is recognizable in images by the thimble-shaped radar dome, or radome, on its chin. The turboprop aircraft has a maximum operational range of about 4,900 miles and can stay in the air for 12 hours, according to the U.S. Army-run ODIN database of military technologies.

Publicly available research suggests the Chinese navy operates eight Y-9JB electronic intelligence planes. The aircraft with the same nose number—21—was last seen flying the same route on March 12, when it accompanied two Chinese air force H-6 nuclear-capable bombers into the area.

Their presence in the Philippine Sea—frequented by the U.S. and allied naval forces—coincided with a weeklong patrol in the same waters by a pair of Chinese warships, Japan’s Joint Staff said last week.

On March 9 and 10, Tokyo said it scrambled fighters to intercept a Chinese navy Y-9Q, an anti-submarine warfare aircraft also known as a KQ-200, which had flown sorties on both days through the Miyako Strait.

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