Commercial airline triggering fighter response
Every now and again, pilots of a civilian commercial airline flying on a normal route screw up. In the event of ATC being unable to positively identify an aircraft, this may cause ATC to get a little nervous and make a call to the local air force base.
If this inability to identify is because pilots didn't contact ATC on entering airspace, and didn't answer calls from ATC to identify themselves, which then triggers a fighter or two being sent up to have a look.... would a commercial airline expect to get a bill in the post from a country's air force for the cost of this if it was due to pilot screw-up rather than (for example) radio malfunction ? Years ago at university, I remember friends getting billed for triggering the smoke alarms and the fire brigade after having a cigarette, so the principle seems to exist... :-)
Note - I am explicitly NOT trying to reference any particular incident, pilot or airline - just wondering how this kind of thing is handled