Newly released audio has revealed the moment a pilot informed air traffic control that Chinese warships were conducting live fire drills in the Tasman Sea.
The transmissions, obtained by 9News, were from February, when a fleet of Chinese Navy vessels was conducting exercises in international waters between Australia and New Zealand.
"We just had a warning from a Chinese naval task force that they're doing a live firing exercise… is anyone aware of that?" the Virgin Australia Pilot asked.
Air traffic control weren't, and asked the pilot if the fleet had informed him what altitude they were firing to.
"Negative," the pilot replied. "Just in that 10-mile radius of that position, that was it."
The pilot then joked: "So if we go missing, you'll know what happened, hey?"
"Good luck," air traffic control replied.
The Virgin flight was outside the 10-mile danger zone, but an Emirates flight was much closer – and needed to be warned by air control.
"The information I've received: a Chinese warship is… commencing live firing," they said. "You will essentially fly right over the top of that position."
The flight was diverted to a safer location.
A Qantas jet was also caught up in the incident. The pilot asked how high the missiles would be flying.
Air traffic control did not know, but the Emirates pilot had learnt they would be flying up to 15 kilometres in the air – an altitude higher than commercial jets.
The warships had been conducting drills in international waters, meaning they had no obligation to inform New Zealand or Australia about the drills.
Following the drills, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said that while the ships were acting within international law, "our issue" was around the firing of live rounds.
"We felt good practice would have been 24 to 48 hours' advance notice, and potentially not in the middle of a trans-Tasman air route.
"But they're completely within the confines of international law — the UN Convention of the law of sea. Those are the same laws that we rely upon with the freedom of navigation that we expect when we move around the world as well.
"That's their decision as to why they're doing it.
"As to where they were going, we're not informed in advance of that. But as I've said, no doubt a much more contested world — certainly not a benign environment."
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