DRONE ATTACK
The drone attack on Russia was one of the biggest to date.
Roman Busargin, governor of the Saratov region about 720km southeast of Moscow, said the cities of Saratov and Engels, on opposite banks of the Volga River, had been subjected to a mass drone attack and there was damage to two industrial sites. Schools had shifted to remote learning, he said.
Ukraine attacked the same region last week and claimed to have struck an oil depot serving an airbase for Russian nuclear bomber planes, causing a huge fire that took five days to put out.
The drone attack struck a munitions storage facility holding guided bombs and missiles at the Engels airbase in Russia’s Saratov region as well as other targets, a source in the Security Service of Ukraine said on Tuesday.
The attack caused a large fire at the Aleksinsky chemical plant in the Tula region and a fire at the Saratovsky oil refinery, while the Bryansk chemical plant was also hit, the source said. Reuters could not independently verify the claims of damage.
The source said there had been subsequent detonations at the Bryansk chemical plant as well as a large fire. The operation was conducted by the SBU and Ukraine’s defence forces, the Ukrainian source told Reuters from Kyiv.
Flight restrictions were imposed at airports in Kazan, Saratov, Penza, Ulyanovsk and Nizhnekamsk, Russia’s aviation watchdog said.
