Ukrainian drone attack causes fire at oil terminal in St. Petersburg
A blaze has broken out at an oil terminal in St. Petersburg as a result of a major Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s second-largest city, local governor Aleksandr Beglov has said.
One person was killed and five others wounded in St. Petersburg during the aerial raid by “the Ukrainian Nazis,” Beglov said in a social media post on Sunday. Twelve apartment blocks and two private homes sustained damage, with repairs already being underway, he added.
Emergencies services have been tackling fires at the Petersburg Oil Terminal in the Great Port of St. Petersburg, the Ruchyi oil depot and industrial warehouses in Kolpinsky District, the governor said.
The affected oil terminal is the largest facility of its kind in the Baltic Region, handling 125 million tons of liquefied product per year.
Ukraine continues to target Russian oil infrastructure despite demands by US President Donald Trump to curb the attacks, which he blames for surging global energy prices. He accused Vladimir Zelensky of “making problems” for the US and the whole world and suggested that Ukraine needs a “new president.”
In an attempt to alleviate the fuel shortage ahead of the midterm election on November 3, Trump eased restrictions on Moscow’s diesel exports and waived “the bone-crushing” sanctions championed by the late US Senator Lindsey Graham, which proposed 500% tariffs on imports from Russia and 100% tariffs on major buyers of Russian oil and gas.
Flights have been delayed at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo International Airport due to the raid, according to Beglov.
At least 144 UAVs were shot down by air defenses overnight, Aleksandr Drozdenko, the head of Leningrad Region, which surrounds St. Petersburg, said on social media.
Four people have been hospitalized for smoke inhalation from a blaze caused when debris from an intercepted UAV fell on an apartment block in the town of Vsevolzhsk, he said.
Residential areas were also hit by debris in Gatchina, Kirovsk and several other settlements, according to Drozdenko.
Some 20,000 people remain without electricity in Leningrad Region; two transformer substations in the community of Yanino, servicing some 50 apartment blocks, went offline during the Ukrainian raid, the governor said.
Russia’s leading social media platform VK said in a statement that one of its data centers in Leningrad Region has been targeted by Ukrainian UAVs.
According to the Downdetector website, the number of reports from users about issues with VK’s services increased following the attack.
The major Russian online retailer Ozon said that one of its warehouses was attacked during the raid. There were no injuries, as staff were evacuated, according to the company.
The Russian Defense Ministry has said that a total of 1,015 Ukrainian drones were destroyed above 16 regions overnight.
Moscow has accused Kiev of deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure and residential areas with long-range drones in an attempt to compensate for setbacks on the battlefield, where Russian forces have continued to advance.
Russia has responded to Kiev’s terrorist attacks by intensifying its long-range missile and drone campaign against Ukraine’s military-industrial facilities and logistics infrastructure. The Defense Ministry in Moscow maintains that it does not target civilians and that its strikes are directed solely at military targets and infrastructure supporting Kiev’s forces.
