Three strikes in 12 days. That is the count at Tuapse, the Russian Black Sea oil port, after Ukrainian drones hit its terminals again on April 28 and set off another large fire. Ukraine’s military confirmed the attack, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Firefighters had only just put out the blazes from the earlier raids. It had been four days since the major fire at the oil terminal was fully extinguished.
“A large-scale fire broke out at the oil refinery following an attack by enemy drones,” said Venyamin Kondratyev, governor of the Krasnodar region. Residents living near the refinery were being evacuated, he said.
President Vladimir Putin received a report from Emergency Situations Minister Aleksandr Kurenkov, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, citing Russian state media. Putin told the minister to fly to Tuapse within hours and oversee the firefighting at oil storage facilities.
What the site does
The complex includes a refinery run by state-owned Rosneft that can process about 240,000 barrels of crude a day and supplies fuel oil and diesel. It also holds Russia’s main Black Sea oil export terminal and related facilities.
Ukraine’s drone forces commander, Robert Brovdi, gave the raid a name: “Tuapse 3.0,” a “remake of Groundhog Day.”
Fallout on the ground
The region now faces what the report called a looming environmental disaster. Large amounts of oil have washed up on local beaches, and some reports describe oil droplets falling from the sky. After the previous strikes, oil-contaminated rain and heavy smog covered Tuapse last week. Residents said black droplets fell and the air was hard to breathe.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said 186 Ukrainian drones were destroyed over the country overnight on April 28. Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russian oil facilities in recent months, cutting exports and limiting Moscow’s ability to cash in on a spike in global energy prices. That spike followed the Iran war and Tehran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
Russia’s own strikes continued. Ukraine’s military said Russian forces launched 123 drones in the same period, hitting several regions. In Kryviy Rih, a Russian attack killed one person and wounded five, the regional head reported on April 28.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy put the past week’s toll in numbers in an April 27 post on X: “approximately 1,900 attack drones, nearly 1,400 guided aerial bombs, and around 60 missiles of various types” launched against Ukraine.
