Russian air defenses thwarted a large Ukrainian drone strike overnight, detecting and destroying 121 drones aimed at 13 locations, including Moscow, Russia's Defence Ministry announced on Friday, with no indication of fatalities or damage.
According to the ministry, six drones were destroyed above Moscow and one over the city, while others targeted other regions, notably those bordering Ukraine and Kursk, where Ukrainian forces remain despite Russian efforts to expel them.
Twenty drones had also targeted the Ryazan region, southeast of Moscow, according to the ministry, and channels on the Telegram messaging app released unconfirmed videos of what bloggers claimed as major fires in the area. They said that an oil storage facility and a power station had been struck.
Meanwhile, Ukraine's air force announced on Friday that it had successfully defended itself against a Russian drone strike conducted overnight.
Ukraine's interior ministry reported that drone debris killed two men and a lady in the central Kyiv district, injuring another.
Commenting on the damage inflicted by Ukraine’s drone assaults, Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine’s center for combatting disinformation, stated on Telegram that an oil refinery in Ryazan had been targeted as well as the Kremniy facility in Bryansk.
Reuters could not corroborate such allegations, but Russia's state RIA news agency published a statement from the Kremniy facility as claiming that work at the factory had been halted following an attack by six drones that did not injure anyone. According to Interfax news agency, local officials are clearing the area after drone fragments impacted a factory.
Pavel Malkov, the Ryazan regional governor, stated on Telegram that emergency personnel were dealing with the aftermath.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said early Friday that air defenses had thwarted Ukrainian drone strikes in four areas throughout the Russian city.
Sobyanin, writing on Telegram, stated that air defenses southeast of the city in Kolomna and Ramenskoye had repulsed "enemy" drones, but did not specify the number.
“At the site where fragments fell, no damage or casualties occurred,” Sobyanin wrote. “Specialist emergency crews are at the site.”
Sobyanin stated that two drones headed for Moscow were shot down by air defenses in Podolsk, south of the city, as well as a single drone destroyed in Troitsky, southwest of the capital, and Shchyolkovo, northeast.
According to Russian news media, Rosaviatsiya, the federal aviation administration, said that two Moscow airports, Vnukovo and Domodedovo, were now operating after temporarily stopping operations. Six planes were rerouted to other airports.
Mayor Igor Kutsak of Kursk reported that the midnight attack damaged power cables and shut off energy to one city area.
According to the Defence Ministry statement, drones were also destroyed over the border districts of Bryansk and Belgorod, as well as the Crimean Peninsula. Saratov, Rostov, Voronezh, Tula, Oryol, and Lipetsk were also attacked.
