Large fires broke out early Monday at two oil depots in the Russian city of Bryansk, less than 100 miles from the border with Ukraine, as potential sabotage by Kyiv.
Russian state media reported that the first fire broke out in a civilian facility in Bryansk containing 10,000 tons of fuel, followed by a second fire in a military fuel depot containing 5,000 tons.
Bryansk, less than 100 miles northeast of the Ukrainian border, serves as a logistics base for Moscow’s military campaign in Ukraine.
Images posted on Russian social media show pillars of smoke rising from facilities in the Russian city on Monday morning.
Military analyst Rob Lee said the footage suggested the fire was “probably” caused by Ukrainian sabotage. “It sounds like something was flying in the air before the explosion. “I think it was probably a Ukrainian attack, but we can’t be sure,” Lee said.
“The fact that these are two separate sites near the border is important,” Lee said, adding that the fires may have been caused by a Tochka-U tactical ballistic missile, which he said could have reached both targets if deployed near the Russian-Ukrainian border.
Lee added that if Ukraine’s involvement is confirmed, the strikes may have been aimed at “disrupting fuel supplies to the Russian military”.
In a statement on its website, the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations mentioned only one of the fires, saying a facility owned by the Transneft pipeline company at 2 a.m. local time caught fire and there was no need to evacuate parts of the city with 400,000 people. .
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Russia’s Investigative Committee said in a separate statement that it had ordered an investigation into the incident. Ukrainian authorities have not yet commented on the fire.
Several videos posted on social media on Monday morning appeared to show the timing of the explosion at one of Bryansk’s oil depots.
According to Baza, a news channel in the Telegram with links to Russian security services, the fires were caused by Ukrainian drones.
Russia has repeatedly accused Ukrainians of striking on its territory.
Last week, Moscow blamed Ukrainian helicopters for hitting apartment buildings and injuring seven people in Bryansk. In early April, the governor of the Belgorod region, which is also close to the border with Ukraine, said two Kiev helicopters fired at a fuel depot there, claiming that Ukraine denied it. Russia’s defense ministry has promised to bomb targets in Kyiv in response to “terrorist and sabotage” attacks on its territory by Ukraine’s “nationalist regime.”
Russia has suffered a series of major fires at government facilities across the country in recent weeks.
On Friday, 17 people died after a huge fire broke out at a key Russian defense research institute in Tver, northwest of Moscow. On the same day, a large chemical plant near Moscow caught fire. Russia, where accidental fires are common due to destroyed infrastructure, has blamed the Tver fire for aging cables.
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