Ukraine’s military said Wednesday it had struck a fuel storage depot in the heart of Russia, causing a massive fire at the facility that supplies a major Russian air base.
Russian officials acknowledged a major drone attack in the area and said authorities had set up an emergency command center to fight the fire.
The General Staff of the Ukrainian army said the assault hit the storage facility near Engels in Russia’s Saratov region, about 600 kilometers east of the Ukrainian border. The depot supplied a nearby airfield used by planes that launch missiles across the border into Ukraine, according to a statement posted on Facebook.
Ukraine has been building up its arsenal of long-range missiles and domestically produced drones capable of reaching deep into the front line as it faces restrictions on the range at which its army can fire its supplied missiles through the West to Russia.
The attacks have disrupted Russian logistics in the nearly three-year-old war and embarrassed the Kremlin.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced last year that his country had developed a weapon capable of hitting a target 700 kilometers away. Some Ukrainian drone attacks have hit targets more than 1,000 kilometers away.
Saratov Region Governor Roman Busargin said an unspecified industrial plant in Engels was damaged by falling drone debris that started a fire, but did not injure anyone.
Engels, which has a population of more than 220,000, is located on the left bank of the Volga and is home to several industrial factories. Saratov, a large industrial city of around 900,000 inhabitants, faces Engels across the river.
“The damage to the oil base creates serious logistical problems for the strategic aviation of the Russian occupiers and significantly reduces their ability to strike peaceful Ukrainian cities and civilian objects. To be continued,” the Ukrainian General Staff said in a statement.
Russian authorities restricted flights early Wednesday at airports in Saratov, Ulyanovsk, Kazan and Nizhnekamsk, in an apparent response to the Ukrainian attack.
The main base for Russia’s nuclear-capable strategic bombers is located just outside Engels. It has been the target of Ukrainian drone attacks since the start of the war, forcing the Russian army to move most bombers to other areas.
