In a coordinated overnight campaign designed to ramp up economic pressure on Moscow amid the ongoing full-scale invasion, Ukrainian forces have carried out multiple drone strikes targeting key oil and energy infrastructure across Russia and Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories, officials from both sides confirmed on Monday. The cross-border attacks marked one of the largest mutually exchanged drone barrages in recent weeks of the war.
Russia’s defense ministry announced that its air defense systems intercepted and destroyed 310 Ukrainian drones launched throughout the night, with targets spread across the Moscow region, western and southwestern areas of Russia, the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula, and the maritime zones of the Black and Azov Seas. In a reciprocal strike, Russia launched 155 drones at Ukrainian territory; Ukraine’s Air Force reported that its air defense units successfully neutralized 124 of these incoming unmanned aerial vehicles through a combination of shootdowns and electronic jamming.
Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed that one of its primary targets was the Grushovaya oil transshipment base located near Novorossiysk in Russia’s Krasnodar Krai region. This facility ranks among the largest oil and petroleum product transshipment hubs in southern Russia, playing a critical role in Russia’s domestic and export energy logistics. Regional Russian authorities verified that a drone attack triggered a large blaze at the site, though they confirmed no fatalities or injuries were reported in the incident. While officials declined to disclose the full scale of damage to the infrastructure, they confirmed that more than 130 emergency response workers and 39 pieces of fire-fighting equipment were deployed to contain and extinguish the fire.
A second key target inside Russia was the Krasny Yar linear production and dispatching station in the Volgograd region, which also sustained a direct hit that sparked an outbreak of fire. Andrei Bocharov, the governor of Volgograd region, confirmed the attack and stated that no personnel had been injured, though he offered no additional details about the facility’s core operations or the extent of damage to the site.
Beyond Russian territory, Ukrainian forces carried out two coordinated strikes on energy facilities in the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula on Sunday night. First, drones hit the Semykolodezkaya oil base, which Ukrainian military officials stated is used to store fuel reserves exclusively for Russian military operations in the region. A second strike targeted an oil depot near the Crimean coastal city of Feodosia, according to the General Staff’s official statement posted to Telegram. Both strikes resulted in large fires at the target sites.
In a separate attack in Crimea, a Ukrainian drone hit a passenger train traveling on the Moscow-Simferopol route early Monday, Sergei Aksyonov, the Kremlin-appointed head of the occupied region, confirmed. The strike left the train’s driver with injuries and killed the driver’s assistant, Aksyonov said, adding that all passengers on board remained unharmed. Following the attack, all passenger rail traffic across Crimea was suspended indefinitely to allow for security and repair work. Russian rail operator Grand Service Express announced that passengers had been safely evacuated and replacement bus service had been arranged for travelers to complete their journeys.