Fires broke out at an oil refinery, two fuel depots and a sea port in southern Russia after Ukrainian drone attacks, local officials said Friday. Residents of affected areas were evacuated.
The strikes came shortly after President Vladimir Putin acknowledged that repeated attacks on the sector were causing fuel shortages across the country. Last month he said a task force was working to ease them, but described the problems as “not of a critical nature.”
Where the fires started
In Krasnodar region, the Ilsky refinery caught fire when drone debris fell across the Severskaya district, officials said, including into the courtyard of a private home. The plant can process around 138,000 barrels of oil a day. It has been hit several times before.
Next door in Rostov region, Governor Yury Slyusar said on Telegram that firefighters were tackling blazes at two fuel depots in the Azov district and at the Taganrog sea port. The Kyiv Post reported that early indications put the fire at Taganrog’s Kurgannefteprodukt oil terminal, which handles loading and unloading of petroleum products for sea-going ships.
Taganrog Mayor Svetlana Kambulova said people were moved out of homes in the affected areas. A private house was damaged and the roof of an administrative building caught fire.
One caution applies to all of this. Russian authorities often put fires after drone raids down to debris from intercepted aircraft. Ukrainian and independent accounts frequently describe the same events as direct hits.
The pressure on Russian fuel
Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russian energy and other infrastructure in recent months, aiming to weaken Moscow’s ability to pay for the war. Repeated hits on refineries have added to shortages, long lines at filling stations and higher prices across Russia.
Kyiv calls the strikes retaliation for Russia’s near-daily attacks on Ukrainian civilians and energy facilities since the full-scale invasion of February 2022. Russia’s Defence Ministry said its air defense units intercepted 376 Ukrainian drones overnight, some of them approaching the Moscow region.
