A Ukrainian attack set the home of Russia's Black Sea Fleet ablaze Wednesday, damaging two warships and injuring dozens of people, Russian authorities said.
The incident appeared to be the latest in a growing wave of strikes against the Kremlin's navy. It came as Moscow hit a key Ukrainian port city in the Odesa region with a drone attack.
Sevastopol is the largest city on the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula, and the port is the main base of the Russian fleet, which has been used to launch attacks deep into Ukraine.
The Russian Defense Ministry said Ukraine had attacked a shipyard in the port city with 10 cruise missiles and used sea drones to attack some ships in the sea. The ministry said that seven cruise missiles were shot down and that all sea drones were destroyed.
Two ships that were being repaired in the shipyard were damaged, the ministry said. It added in an update later that the two ships will be fully restored and "will continue to serve in combat as part of their fleets."
A press officer with Ukrainian military intelligence said a landing ship and a submarine were hit.
The Moscow-installed governor of the city, Mikhail Razvozhayev, reported the incident overnight, saying that Sevastopol was attacked by “our enemies” and that air defense was engaged. He also said there was a fire in one of the harbor bays.
Razvozhayev later said that the fire was at a shipyard and that at least 24 people were injured. A photo he shared appeared to show port infrastructure engulfed in flames.
Videos and photos geolocated by NBC News show loud explosions and fireballs in the night sky over the shipyard, as well as bright red flames engulfing a part of it.
Russia normally blames any attacks on its own territory and occupied parts of Ukraine on Kyiv, which usually refrains from official public comments, apart from occasional sarcastic remarks by its top officials.
However, this time Ukraine’s air force chief appeared to acknowledge the attack.
Mykola Oleschuk, the commander of Ukraine’s air forces, thanked his pilots for their “excellent combat work” on Telegram as he said “the occupiers” were still recovering in Sevastopol. “More to come,” he added.
The incident is the latest in a series of attacks on Russian soil and occupied Ukrainian territories as Kyiv appears to be delivering on President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s promise to bring the war home to Russia.
Tech billionaire Elon Musk came under rhetorical fire from Kyiv after it emerged that he thwarted a major attack on the Russian navy in Sevastopol last year, refusing a request to use his Starlink satellite service, as he did not want to be directly drawn into the war.
But since then, Ukraine has ramped up its efforts to strike behind enemy lines.
Last month, a Russian warship appeared to have suffered serious damage after a sea drone attack on the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk in southern Russia. A day later, Moscow said a Ukrainian drone hit a Russian tanker that was under U.S. sanctions near a strategic bridge in the Kerch Strait that links Russia to the annexed Crimean Peninsula.
The bridge, a pet project of President Vladimir Putin, came under attack twice in less than a year. Moscow blamed Ukraine for hitting the span in October, seriously damaging it, and in July, in an attack that killed two civilians.
Meanwhile, drone attacks on Moscow and other major Russian cities are nearly daily occurrences, while Ukraine’s military pushes for a breakthrough in its counteroffensive on the ground.
