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Ukrainian long-range drones attacked a major Russian port over the weekend, a security source said.
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Video footage shows a drone hitting the facility and causing a large fireball.
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Russia's Ust-Luga port is used to support a rogue and fraudulent “shadow fleet”.
Ukrainian forces attacked a major commercial port in Russia over the weekend, using long-range drones to target and disrupt the operations of Moscow's sanctions “shadow fleet”.
The Security Service of Ukraine, known as the SBU, carried out the raid Saturday on Ust-Luga, a port in northwestern Russia near the city of St. Petersburg, a source in the agency confirmed to Business Insider. Monday.
The SBU source said the drones flew more than 550 miles and “successfully hit their targets”, with one drone hitting containers filled with gas condensate, causing an explosion that severely damaged one device and sent shrapnel to three others nearby.
Video footage obtained by BI appears to show the moment the drone hits the ships. Intermittent gunfire can be heard ringing out in the background, suggesting that Russia attempted to shoot down the drone as it drew closer to its target.
However, these efforts were ultimately unsuccessful, and the drone crashed into Russian infrastructure, causing a large fireball and explosion. The SBU source, citing unnamed experts, said that the repair of this facility will take some time and disrupt the port's operations.
BI was unable to independently verify details of the attack provided by SBU.
Ust-Luga is Russia's largest commercial port in the Leningrad region and a major logistics center along the Baltic Sea. The SBU source said that Moscow is using the facility to sell oil and gas using the so-called “shadow fleet”.
The “shadow fleet” refers to the collection of ships used by Moscow avoid international sanctions has exported energy sent in response to its invasion of Ukraine and maintained a large flow of money to support its war efforts.
According to the European Parliament, this fraudulent, fraudulent network includes aging and poorly maintained vessels with unclear ownership and origins. The ships use various tactics to hide their movements and activities, such as transmitting false data, moving from ship to ship, blackout of the automatic identification system, and other fraudulent practices.
“As Russia relies more and more on the 'shadow fleet' to maintain oil exports,” the European Parliament said write in a statement published last year, “the EU and associated countries have implemented measures to combat these evasion methods.”
They said the measures include sanctions on certain vessels and increased international cooperation to prevent malignant activity that helps increase Russia's war chest. However, Ukraine seems to favor direct military action.
“Drone sanctions from the SBU reduce the money that Russia needs to pay for war,” said the security source, according to a translation of their comments shared by BI.
The attack on Ust-Luga over the weekend marks the latest long Ukrainian strike on Russian soil. Kyiv has relied heavily on its arsenal of home-made drones for cross-border operations, using these highly explosive unmanned systems to target Moscow's energy and military resources.
In recent months, Ukrainian drones have struck Russian military basesairfields, and weapons storage facilities.
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