Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) detained two men suspected of scouting targets for Russian strikes on Sloviansk and Dnipro, the agency reported on 14 October. Catching both early let it secure Ukrainian reserve command posts and the gas stations the alleged agents had been hunting, the agency added.

Sloviansk anchors the northern end of the Fortress Belt, the chain of fortified cities that has held Ukraine’s defense of Donetsk Oblast since 2014. Russia is pushing to seize them, and its aircraft bombed a residential area of Sloviansk on 11 October. Where Ukrainian convoys stop and troops gather is exactly what Russian handlers allegedly asked these suspects to supply.

A gas station worker suspected of filming convoys

The first suspect worked at a gas station complex in Sloviansk, Donetsk Oblast. Russian intelligence allegedly reached him through a former classmate who left for Russia after the full-scale invasion and now works for its special services, the SBU said. He then allegedly used his phone to secretly film Ukrainian army convoys at or near gas stations. He was allegedly supposed to send the photos and videos to Russia to help it prepare a targeted strike. He also allegedly drove his own car around other gas stations and bridges that the Defense Forces use for logistics.

Spotted through Telegram comments

The second suspect, a former Pokrovsk resident, moved to Dnipro in 2024 and settled in a dormitory. Russian intelligence noticed him through pro-Kremlin comments he posted in Telegram chats, investigators say. A female handler in Russia allegedly tasked him with guiding missile and drone attacks on places in the city where Ukrainian troops and equipment were concentrated. He allegedly scouted on foot or took public transport to reach outlying districts.

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Officers seized computers and smartphones containing evidence of the men’s alleged work for Russia. Both are suspected of treason under martial law and of unauthorized dissemination of information on Ukrainian troop movements or deployment, under Articles 111(2) and 114-2(2) of the Criminal Code. They remain in custody without bail and face up to life imprisonment with confiscation of property. The SBU’s office for Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts ran the operation under the Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor’s Office.

A drone strike on 10 October put more than half of the large fuel tanks out of action at an oil-loading terminal in Russia’s Rostov-on-Don, Russian news Telegram channel Astra found. The terminal loads fuel onto river and sea tankers for export, and it burned for two days while a local channel wrote that reeds might be on fire. Neither Kyiv nor Moscow has officially acknowledged the hit. It came hours after US President Donald Trump announced a diesel deal with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

Russia has spent the autumn hammering Ukraine’s power grid ahead of winter. Ukraine’s long-range drones keep hitting the refineries, depots, and terminals that fuel Russia’s army and earn it export revenue. Every burned tank turns that revenue into repair bills, while Moscow is already subsidizing its own fuel pumps. A refinery-only truce of the kind the White House described a day after the strike would shield the Russian plants that feed terminals like this one.

Seven of 12 tanks out of action

Astra’s analysts concluded from eyewitness footage that at least seven of the terminal’s 12 large tanks had been knocked out. Ukrainian monitoring channel Supernova+ counted seven burned-out tanks and one more scorched by the fire.

The fire was still burning in the early hours of 12 October. Local channel Rostov Glavny posted video of the burning tank farm, passing on rumors that reeds were on fire and noting the city’s second day under smoke, The Moscow Times reported. Footage filmed in the daytime on 12 October showed no more open flames, only gray smoke, according to Astra.

A terminal that loads fuel for export

The site is the oil-loading terminal of the Novoshakhtinsk Oil Products Plant, formerly known as Yug Rusi, in Rostov-on-Don’s Zheleznodorozhny District. It receives, stores, and transships fuel onto river and sea tankers, including for export, Ukrainian monitoring channel Exilenova+ said.

The terminal also supplies fuel to the Russian army and earns Moscow hard currency, ZN reported. The Moscow Times put its loading capacity at 3.5 million tons a year and its tank farm at about 60,000 cubic meters, roughly 16 million gallons.

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The refinery itself stands in the town of Novoshakhtinsk near the border with Russian-occupied Luhansk Oblast. The terminal sits on the Don River with access to the Sea of Azov, Ukrainian military outlet Militarnyi noted. Ukraine hit the refinery in June, and Ukraine’s General Staff reported striking the Yug Rusi terminal on 9 July, placing it in Bataysk.

A night of drones over the region

Exilenova+ posted images of the burning terminal in the early hours of 10 October. It presented them as the site after Trump’s phone call with Putin. The channel later shared NASA satellite fire data showing the blaze.

Rostov Oblast Governor Yuri Slyusar claimed the attack injured six people. Slyusar further stated air defenses downed more than 100 drones over the region. Radio Liberty’s Russian Service noted that neither side had officially confirmed the hit on the terminal.

Hours after the US-Russia diesel deal

The strike came hours after Trump announced on 9 October that Russia had agreed to supply diesel to US and global markets. The US Treasury then cleared the trade with a sanctions license.

On 11 October, Trump declared an “energy ceasefire” between Russia and Ukraine. Under it, he expects Ukraine to stop striking Russian refineries, a White House official told Axios.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that evening that Ukraine’s armed forces had received all relevant orders. Neither Ukrainian monitoring channels nor Russian officials have reported a new strike on a Russian oil facility since. On 13 October, Zelenskyy said Ukraine was ready to guarantee an energy ceasefire if Russia took matching steps.

Russia's seaborne exports of refined oil products rose to a three-month high in September, but the growth came from cheaper fuel oil and naphtha as diesel shipments fell to their lowest in more than a decade, Bloomberg reported, citing Vortexa data. Russia kept diesel at home after Ukrainian refinery strikes and paid oil companies to supply its pumps, while high crude prices lifted its crude export earnings.

During the ongoing deep-strike campaign, Ukraine's long-range drones have knocked out more than half of Russia's oil refining capacity, Kyiv says, and Russia's budget oil revenues are falling even as it raises war spending. High global crude prices are softening that blow.

Cheaper fuel out

Total seaborne product exports reached about 1.17 million barrels a day in September. Fuel oil shipments rose 6% to about 613,000 barrels a day, the highest since April. Naphtha, a feedstock for petrochemicals, jumped 35% to 363,000 barrels a day. Exports of refinery feedstocks, including vacuum gasoil, rose to about 32,000 barrels a day, according to Bloomberg.

The trade has moved north. Almost 80% of fuel oil cargoes left from Baltic ports, and naphtha loadings there rose almost 50% as Ukrainian attacks disrupted Black Sea infrastructure. In September, Ukraine reported hitting an oil terminal in Novorossiysk, Russia's main Black Sea oil port—one in a string of attacks on Russia's Black Sea ports and oil sites.

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More than 500 drones by Moscow’s count: Kh-101 fuel plant, second Yandex data center, and a far-north refinery hit

Diesel kept at home

Diesel and gasoil exports fell 28% to 144,000 barrels a day, the lowest monthly volume in Vortexa data going back more than a decade. Russia has restricted diesel exports to protect domestic supply after Ukrainian attacks on its refineries. Drones kept hitting them into October, from a Lukoil refinery in Volgograd to Gazprom's Salavat complex in Bashkortostan.

In September, Russia paid oil companies the biggest subsidy in more than four years to keep road fuel on the domestic market. It also imported about 350,000 tonnes of motor fuel by sea, mostly gasoline from India, Morocco, and Türkiye, Reuters calculations showed. Officials are considering letting some producers resume diesel exports in October to avoid overstocking, according to Interfax.

The diesel squeeze has reached the White House. US President Donald Trump stated on 30 September that diesel was hurt "not by the Middle East, but by what's going on in Russia, because those diesel refineries are being knocked out at a pretty alarming rate."

Crude carries the revenue

Russia's crude exports reached about 3.99 million barrels a day in the week to 27 September, and the estimated value of its seaborne crude shipments neared its highest since the full-scale invasion began, Bloomberg reported. Brent crude traded at about $102.60 a barrel on 9 October, according to Trading Economics data.

Drones struck a plant making fuel components for Russia's Kh-101 cruise missiles and a second Yandex data center overnight on 9 October, Russian officials and monitoring channels reported. The same night, fires were reported at a refinery in Russia's far north and an oil depot near Belgorod. Russia claimed it downed more than 500 drones, and Ukraine has not claimed any of the strikes.

Ukraine has spent months hitting refineries and arms suppliers deep inside Russia. Russia, meanwhile, keeps firing Kh-101 cruise missiles at Ukrainian cities, including the one that killed 22 people in Pryluky on 7 October.

The plant behind the Kh-101's fuel

The Redkino Experimental Plant in Tver Oblast came under attack overnight, Ukrainian monitoring channel Exilenova+ reported. It said the plant makes components of Decilin-M, a fuel for Kh-55 and Kh-101 cruise missiles, as well as additives for diesel and aviation kerosene.

Tver Oblast Governor Vitaly Korolev claimed a plant in Redkino caught fire as a drone attack was being repelled. He did not name the plant. No workers were hurt, he said.

The plant also makes ferrocene derivatives, which serve as burn catalysts in solid-fuel rocket motors, Militarnyi reported. The UK sanctioned it in September 2025. Drones attacked it in September 2023 and twice in one night in June 2024, the outlet said.

In February, drones of the Security Service of Ukraine's (SBU) Alpha unit struck the plant, sparking a large fire, SBU sources told Kyiv Post. The Kh-101 is the missile Russia used against Pryluky on 7 October, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

Yandex loses a second data center

Part of Yandex's data center in Kaluga was damaged in the drone attack, and several modules were completely knocked out, the company's press service told Interfax, Russian newspaper Kommersant reported. Some Yandex services may run with interruptions, no one was hurt, and the company is still assessing the damage, Yandex said.

Kaluga Oblast Governor Vladislav Shapsha claimed nine people were injured in the overnight attack on the region. A day earlier, a drone attack forced Yandex to fully shut its data center in Sasovo, Ryazan Oblast.

A refinery in the north, a depot near Belgorod

Locals reported an attack on the Ukhta refinery in the Komi Republic, followed by a fire, Exilenova+ said. The Lukoil-owned plant can process about 4.2 million metric tons of oil a year, making gasoline, diesel, fuel oil, and vacuum gasoil. The extent of the damage is unclear.

An oil depot north of Belgorod was also burning after the night's attack, the channel posted. Belgorod's regional headquarters claimed two people were killed and four injured, including a child, in the Belgorod district.

A large fire also broke out in Pushkino near Moscow, likely at a truck parking lot, Astra reported. The cause is unknown.

Repeated strikes on Redkino target a specialty fuel that Russia's cruise missiles depend on, while two Yandex data centers hit in two nights bring the war to services ordinary Russians use every day.

Russia has shown a drone interceptor built on the Alazan, a civilian anti-hail rocket, Militarnyi reported. The sample went on display at a weapons exhibition that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin toured at the Chebarkul training range in the Urals on 2 October.

Ukraine now sends drones at Russia by the hundreds, by Moscow's own count. Russia's Defense Ministry claimed its air defenses intercepted nearly 900 overnight into 6 October. Russia's missile-based air defense was built to repel aircraft raids and a few cruise missiles, not swarms of low-flying drones.

In May, Ukrainian intelligence said Russia was adding four regiments, 24 battalions, and 162 batteries to counter Ukrainian strike drones. The converted Alazan, which Militarnyi calls an anti-drone system, is one more piece of that search. Meanwhile, the commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert Brovdi, said his forces struck 300 Russian air-defense assets between January and 19 September.

From hail reagent to shrapnel

Based on the size of the sample on display, the interceptor builds on the Alazan-2M or Alazan-6 series, Militarnyi assessed. The outlet put the stated cost at up to $12,000 per unit but did not say who named the figure. In civilian service, the rocket flies about 10 km, climbs up to 8 km, and carries about 0.5 kg of reagent. For air defense, the developers plan to replace that reagent with a fragmentation warhead.

Militarnyi's analysis of the published photos describes the front end as a steering assembly: four cruciform deflector fins, probably paired with a seeker or a fuze. At the rear sit folding stabilizers and the open nozzle of a solid-fuel motor, held in a metal cradle.

One sample among 300 exhibits

The Kremlin's account of the visit lists more than 300 weapons on display, including interceptor drones, but does not mention the rocket. Propaganda channel Russia 1 aired the interceptor in its report from the visit, and the Kremlin pool of state news agency RIA posted photos.

Russian FPV drones hit three ambulances and, separately, a residential high-rise in Kramatorsk late on 5 October, the Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor's Office said. The strike on the high-rise killed a woman and injured another, and three medical workers were wounded trying to save their vehicles. Prosecutors have opened war-crimes investigations.

Russian drones attack Ukrainian civilians every day, and Ukraine's UN envoy has cited "human safari" and repeat strikes on medics as grounds to strip Moscow of its Security Council seat. Kherson, Nikopol, and Kramatorsk are all cities where drone operators pick civilian targets in real time.

Drones aimed at ambulances

Between 22:00 and 22:25, the Russian army deliberately directed two FPV drones at ambulances parked on a Kramatorsk street, prosecutors said. Three workers of the ambulance service were injured while trying to save the vehicles after the first hit. They suffered blast injuries, shrapnel wounds to the body and limbs, burns, and concussions, and received medical care. Three ambulances were damaged.

FPV drones are flown by an operator watching a live camera feed until the moment of impact. Prosecutors called the strike targeted.

A woman killed at home

At 22:10, a Russian drone hit a residential high-rise in the city. A 49-year-old woman was killed. Another resident, a 68-year-old woman, suffered a broken foot, shrapnel wounds to the body and limbs, and a concussion, according to prosecutors. The Kramatorsk district prosecutor's office has opened criminal proceedings over war crimes.

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Across Donetsk Oblast, Russian attacks killed three people on 5 October, in Sloviansk, Druzhkivka, and Sukhanivka, and injured 11, Donetsk Oblast head Vadym Filashkin said. His morning tally, posted before the prosecutors' report, did not include the Kramatorsk death.

Kramatorsk under the drone hunt

Russian drone operators have hunted people in Kramatorsk for months. In June, a Russian pilot chose to kill a man he saw on a city street. Russia strikes the city daily, and in August it dropped eight FAB-250 bombs on Kramatorsk, killing one person and injuring 18.

The same drone hunting of civilians has run for years in Kherson, where Ukraine's Security Service has named 10 Russian servicemen it ties to the "human safari." A UN inquiry has traced the Kherson campaign up the chain of command. In April, ISW found Russians using such tactics across southern Ukraine, including in Nikopol.

Medics have been repeated targets. In March, a Russian FPV drone killed two medics in an ambulance in Kharkiv Oblast, and in February, Russian drones hit an ambulance and a shop there, killing three. In Kyiv, a Russian missile attack damaged a maternity hospital in September.

Drones attacked Moscow and Moscow Oblast overnight on 6 October, and a fire broke out at the Volodarskaya pipeline station, the region's largest oil depot, monitoring Telegram channels reported. The station supplies jet fuel to Moscow's main airports. Local authorities did not mention the fire, while claiming to have downed hundreds of drones.

Ukraine's long-range drones have spent years working through Russia's oil industry, and Kyiv says its strikes have now disabled more than half of Russia's refining capacity. The storage and pipeline hubs that move the remaining fuel are what keep the army, the capital, and the export flows supplied.

Fire at the Moscow region's largest fuel depot

Ukrainian monitoring channel Exilenova+ wrote that the Volodarskaya station was burning after the attack, and Ukrainian monitoring channel Supernova+ reported the strike on the depot. Exilenova+ then posted the site's coordinates near the village of Konstantinovo. Supernova+ said a storage tank was on fire, and Exilenova+, citing locals, later wrote that two tanks were burning.

Russian news Telegram channel Astra geolocated a Supernova+ video to Konstantinovo in Ramensky district. The station had not been reported attacked before, Astra said.

The station lies 40 km from central Moscow, Militarnyi reported. Drone alerts in the area began at 23:43 on 5 October. From 03:24, reports came in of Ukrainian Peklo drones flying through Oryol Oblast toward Moscow Oblast, the outlet said. Ukraine's military has not commented on the strike.

Early in the night, Exilenova+ claimed a strike on the Moscow refinery in Kapotnya. It later said the footage circulating from there was most likely archival.

Jet fuel for Vnukovo, Domodedovo, and Sheremetyevo

The station has 27 tanks with a combined capacity of about 250,000 m³, according to Militarnyi. It connects to the ring pipeline for petroleum products around Moscow, which carries aviation fuel to Vnukovo, Domodedovo, and Sheremetyevo airports. Russia's state pipeline operator Transneft has said the station can move up to 3 million tonnes of jet fuel, 2.8 million tonnes of diesel, and 1.6 million tonnes of gasoline a year.

Astra gave a lower figure: about 3 million tonnes of petroleum products a year in total, arriving from the Moscow and Ryazan refineries. Supernova+ described Volodarskaya as a branch of Transneft–Upper Volga, as did Militarnyi, while Astra named Transnefteprodukt.

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Russia claims hundreds of drones downed

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin claimed that 650 drones flew toward the Moscow region from the evening of 5 October to the morning of 6 October. Most were downed far from the city, and 105 near Moscow, he claimed, without mentioning any damage. Adding up his later posts, Astra counted at least 718 drones aimed at Moscow. Moscow Oblast Governor Andrei Vorobyov claimed that 185 drones were downed over 16 municipalities. He later called it one of the largest drone attacks and put the toll at two killed and nine injured, with 47 detached houses damaged in seven municipalities.

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Not the first Transneft site or Moscow fuel target

Ukraine has targeted Russia's pipeline network before. On 2 October, drones set Transneft's Samara station on fire. During Russia's Duma elections on 20 September, a strike reached Moscow's fuel supply. The Moscow refinery fully stopped processing oil after that attack. Days later, Kyiv offered to halt refinery strikes if Russia stopped hitting Ukraine's power grid. Russia has not taken the deal.

Drones attacked Russia's Khanskaya military airfield in the Republic of Adygea overnight on 4 October, Ukrainian outlet Militarnyi reported. Local reports, footage, and satellite fire data point to a blaze near the base, which trains Russian military pilots and also serves combat aviation. Neither side has reported the extent of the damage.

Ukraine is pressing its long-range campaign against the bases, refineries, and depots that keep Russia's war going, and Kyiv is vowing to hit harder as Russia escalates its strikes on Ukrainian cities. Airfields are part of that target list: in August, Ukraine struck one in Krasnodar Krai in the same overnight wave that hit Russia's second-largest refinery.

Hours of drone alerts, then a fire

Locals reported an attack and a fire at the airfield, Ukrainian monitoring channel Exilenova+ wrote, sharing footage of the blaze. Drone warnings for the area began at 01:42 and lasted until 05:34, Militarnyi said. Over that time, Russian monitoring channels reported drones and active air defenses in the region and around the airfield.

NASA's FIRMS fire-detection data from geostationary orbit also showed a fire in the airfield's area, Militarnyi noted. It also published a video of a Ukrainian drone flying toward the base.

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A pilot school that also serves combat aviation

The airfield lies 6 km northwest of Maykop and 3 km east of the village of Khanskaya, about 500 km from Ukrainian-controlled territory, according to Militarnyi. Before the war, it was used mainly for training flights and hosted L-39 trainer jets.

The 761st Training Aviation Regiment was based there until it was disbanded in 2009, when the 272nd Training Aviation Base was formed in its place. The base, military unit 55661, belongs to the Krasnodar Higher Military Aviation School of Pilots. Ukraine's General Staff said in October 2024 that Su-34, Su-27, and Su-35 jets, which Russia uses in its war against Ukraine, were based at the airfield, Militarnyi wrote. In March 2026, the General Staff said Russian forces actively use it for operational-tactical aviation.

Ukraine has struck the base before

Ukrainian drones attacked the airfield as early as October 2024. On 25 December 2025, Ukraine's General Staff said its forces had hit the Maykop airfield and started a fire. That was the same night Ukraine hit the port of Temryuk. Drones attacked the base again on 29 December, when Russian authorities claimed to have repelled the attack. Ukraine struck the airfield once more in March 2026.

Russia is preparing to make daily life in Kyiv harder before winter, aiming at the ordinary places civilians use rather than at military sites, The Economist reported. Ukrainian officials say the push blends bombing, sabotage, and disinformation, and expect it to peak in November.

Every winter of its full-scale invasion, Russia has tried to freeze Ukrainians into surrender, and each year the strikes reach deeper into ordinary life. The civilian casualties recorded in 2026 have already passed the whole of last year, the UN says.

From the power grid to the grocery store

Russia has already turned its drones on Kyiv's supermarkets, food warehouses, and data centers this year. On 28 September, a Russian jet drone struck the National Academy of Sciences in central Kyiv. The strike killed two people, the Academy said. Survivors climbed from the windows of the burning building. A senior Ukrainian official told The Economist the Kremlin now wants shoppers too afraid to enter a store. Russia is also keeping its winter routine, hitting electricity, water, and sewage systems.

Cheaper jet drones that stream live to their pilots

Most of the damage now comes from Russia's cheap jet drones, The Economist said. Pilots guide them onto targets and watch a live video feed. They are hard to stop, and Russia's ballistic missiles are deadlier still as Ukraine's supply of Patriot interceptors dwindles. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv had agreed a new Patriot interceptor package, but it remains short of interceptors of its own. A security official told The Economist that Russia has thousands of drones stockpiled and plans to use its entire ballistic missile stock within two months.

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Sabotage, chaos, and a city that won't switch off

Ukraine's counter-intelligence services say they foil seven or eight Russian plots a week, and officials believe some sleeper cells remain. The campaign's third element, disinformation, targets war fatigue and corruption scandals. Russia runs the same plan every year, hoping its bot farms will push Ukrainians onto the streets to demand surrender, said Andrii Kovalenko, who heads the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council.

"It's nonsense," he told The Economist, adding that someone is feeding the idea to Putin so they can steal more money.

Kyiv is also far harder to shut down than Moscow assumes, Kovalenko said. The city's internet is too decentralized for a handful of strikes to knock out, The Economist noted. Energy expert Olha Babii said the test is how fast crews restore power, not whether it can be destroyed. The capital is emptying, its population down from about 3.7 million to 3.3 million by The Economist's count.

Russian drones and missiles struck Kyiv data centers over 23–24 September, knocking out internet and hosting providers. The Digital Transformation Ministry said about 100,000 subscribers lost service, NV Business reported.

Russia has widened its air campaign from power plants and warehouses to railways, fuel stations, and now digital infrastructure as it tries to grind down the country's ability to function before another war winter.

"You'd have to destroy 70-80% of Kyiv's buildings"

MiroHost founder and Internet Invest Group head Oleksandr Olshanskyi told NV Business the attack destroyed his own data center.

"Most critically important data and systems have been moved abroad or to the cloud," Olshanskyi said. "If an online store stops working, that's unpleasant but not a tragedy."

He called rumors about a full internet blackout or sharp service price hikes baseless.

"Destroying all internet in a simple way is impossible—you'd have to use nuclear or chemical weapons or destroy 70-80% of buildings in Kyiv," he said.

What Russia hit

The strikes damaged a Kyiv data center housing UTELS switching equipment on 23 September. Overnight into 24 September, Russia destroyed equipment of hosting provider CityHost.UA and the data center housing MiroHost. About 95% of MiroHost's clients operate outside Ukraine and were unaffected, he said. Russia also struck the Pavutyna network's data center. Crazy Network said a missile struck Kyiv's central traffic exchange hub, cutting service for its subscribers in Vinnytsia, Kyiv, and Khmelnytskyi Oblast.

Providers KIEVNET, Domonet, FAUST, and Etherlink also reported disruptions. Ukraine's telecom regulator NKEK said on 24 September that providers were completing emergency restoration, and Domonet estimated service would return by 21:00 that evening.

The 23 September strikes killed two people and injured more than 40, and hit a college building in Kyiv while students were on campus, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha wrote that evening. Russia targeted major Ukrainian data centers "seeking to disrupt the flow of information," he said. "This is critical civilian infrastructure that ensures people can access life-saving information. It is not a military target."

"More sanctions pressure, more missile interceptors are the only way to stop this terror," Sybiha wrote. "These attacks must not become the new normal."

Panic, not military gain

Olshanskyi said Russia uses these strikes to spread fear, not achieve lasting results.

"The enemy's goal is to cause damage, inflame panic, and heighten nervousness," he said.

His data center's destruction "will not affect the situation at the front in any way," he said.

Ukrainian drones struck Rostov-on-Don for the second consecutive night, with OSINT channels reporting the military airbase was likely targeted again, Militarnyi reported on 18 September. The previous night's strike hit the same installation, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reported the destruction of three military aircraft and three helicopters there.

Second consecutive overnight strike

The attack began around midnight, Russian news Telegram channel Astra reported. Rostov-on-Don city mayor Aleksandr Skryabin stated around 02:00 that air defenses were active and urged people to take cover indoors.

Rostov Oblast governor Yurii Slyusar claimed more than 50 drones were downed overnight over Rostov-on-Don, Taganrog, Bataysk, and five other districts. He listed damage to private houses, apartment buildings, cars, and gas pipes but made no mention of the airbase.

Ukrainian OSINT channel Supernova+ suggested the airbase was the target again. Krymsky Veter reported a fire near the airfield. However, Astra noted the published footage had not been verified by its OSINT expert, and the results of the repeat strike on the base remain unverified.

Residents told Astra they heard no air-raid sirens and did not know where shelters were located. The Moscow Times reported locals described "deafening bangs" from around 00:30.

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Drones hit Rostov-on-Don for the second straight night—OSINT monitors say the military airbase was likely the target again

Russia's Defense Ministry claimed 629 Ukrainian drones downed overnight across all regions.

Ukraine's General Staff did not mention the airbase

Ukraine's General Staff reported verified results from several earlier strikes, including a hit on Kombinat Kamensky, a solid-rocket-fuel factory in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, also in Rostov Oblast. The batch did not mention the Rostov-on-Don airbase. That does not necessarily mean the second attack did not take place—the General Staff can report strike results on the same day or days later, once damage is assessed.

Previous night: reported aircraft kills

The previous strike hit the Rostov-on-Don Central military airfield overnight on 17 September. Zelenskyy reported hits on a military transport An-12, two An-26 aircraft, and three helicopters. The SBU said a fire erupted on the aircraft parking area and secondary detonation of ammunition followed, with local residents reporting a large-scale blaze visible across the city. There is no independent verification of these figures.

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Drones hit Rostov-on-Don for the second straight night—OSINT monitors say the military airbase was likely the target again

Ukraine's General Staff had earlier reported strikes on the same airfield on 6 September. Ukrainian forces also reported destroying a Podlyot radar and two Pantsir-S1 air defense systems at the base, though no imagery was released.

Ukraine has been systematically targeting Russian military airfields and their air defenses with drones across the front, from occupied Crimea to Rostov Oblast. In August, a combined strike also hit a Rostov Oblast airfield alongside a major refinery.

Ukrainian drone strikes on the warehouses of Russia's biggest online marketplaces will cost the country's e-commerce 400 million orders and 400 billion rubles ($4.8 billion) in revenue this year, the research firm Data Insight estimates, The Moscow Times reported. It prices what the campaign has done to a whole consumer market, not only to the companies whose warehouses burned. Sellers are cutting back on the platform at the center of it, and Wildberries' payout delays are pushing some of them out.

The forecast, cut by a fifth

Data Insight lowered its growth forecast for Russian online retail by 20%, founder Fyodor Virin said. The market will now grow to 9.6 billion orders this year instead of 10 billion, and to 15 trillion rubles ($178 billion) in sales instead of 15.4 trillion.

That is exclusively the effect of the Ukrainian strikes on marketplace warehouses, Virin said, and most of the loss falls on Wildberries. The bombardment of the depots cut sales because goods were unavailable in a given city or entirely, and because delivery times grew as parcels had to travel further.

All of it lands in the second half of the year. Strikes on Wildberries warehouses began on 18 July and on Ozon's on 25 August, according to Virin. Euromaidan Press reported the first strike on an Ozon warehouse on 22 August.

About 30% of the orders that got stuck or disappeared from sale were cancelled outright, Virin estimates. The rest of the unmet demand went mostly to other online platforms and, to a lesser degree, to physical retail. Payout delays that began in mid-August have pushed some sellers to pull their stock, and Wildberries blamed the first missed round on a DDoS attack.

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A warehouse built to hold up to 54 million items burned down in Tambov Oblast, Russia

What the companies lost

Damage to RWB, the company that runs Wildberries, from the loss of warehouses and infrastructure may reach 147 to 280 billion rubles ($1.7–3.3 billion), while sellers have provisionally lost 445 to 507 billion rubles ($5.3–6 billion), Data Insight's lead analyst Sergei Semko estimated. All of the marketplace's key logistics complexes have been hit, and it could lose a fifth of its network and over half its main hubs at once.

Much of what the sellers lost will not come back. On 22 July, Wildberries' founder said the warehouses were insured but that standard policies do not cover drone-strike risk, and Ozon has told sellers that losses from military action are an entrepreneurial risk neither it nor insurers will compensate.

Total losses for Ozon and its sellers are far lower, at around 100 billion rubles ($1.2 billion). Ozon has a much more branched warehouse network and rents most of its large complexes, Alfa-Bank analysts said. Its shares still fell as much as 29% in a single August session on a day when the Moscow exchange lost 2.9%.

Russian oil refineries earned more in the first half of this year than in the same period a year earlier, even as Ukrainian drone strikes kept a fifth of the country's refining capacity out of action, The Moscow Times reported. Record wholesale prices and fast-growing payments from the federal budget have more than covered what the attacks and the repairs cost. Russian consumers are covering the rest at the pump.

Where the profits come from

Russian refineries earned 938 billion rubles ($11.1 billion) in the first half of 2026, 16.2% more than a year earlier, according to the state statistics service Rosstat. Ukrainian drone strikes have put a fifth of the country's refining capacity out of action.

Two things produced that result, according to Promsvyazbank analyst Yekaterina Krylova: high wholesale prices on the SPIMEX commodity exchange, and a sharp increase in state fuel subsidies.

Wholesale prices took off in March, after the war in the Middle East began: light petroleum products have risen 37% since late February and diesel by a third, with July bringing record exchange prices of 82,600 rubles ($982) per tonne of AI-95 gasoline. Crude got cheaper for the refiners over the same stretch, as the ruble price of Urals oil peaked in spring and fell through the summer while the products made from it kept getting dearer.

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The budget pays the difference, the country pays the bill

Russia's damper mechanism compensates oil companies for selling fuel cheaply at home rather than exporting it, and the payments grow as the gap between domestic and world prices widens.

The Finance Ministry paid out close to 350 billion rubles ($4.2 billion) a month in the second quarter, and 500 billion rubles ($5.9 billion) for July and August together. Krylova expects the subsidies and the prices together to widen net margins by 45% in the third quarter, to 35,000 rubles ($416) per tonne of gasoline.

Russia's retail prices tell the other half of the story. Gasoline has risen 21.2% since January and diesel 18.4%, well above Russian inflation. Budget money lets the majors, which own both the refineries and the filling-station chains, hold their own forecourt prices near inflation. Independent chains have no such cushion: they buy at the higher wholesale prices and sell dearer, which is how Russia has been squeezing them out of the market. For drivers, the crisis has been physical as well as financial, with rationing and dry pumps spreading across dozens of regions.

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What the strikes have cost

Ukrainian drones have been hitting Russian refineries since 2024, and the campaign escalated sharply from August 2025, when strikes deep inside Russia became systematic. Russian refineries disclose none of their losses from it.

Ukraine's General Staff estimated the total damage to the Russian oil industry since August 2025 at $13.5 billion, in a count published in early July. The insurance broker Mains put direct losses to the oil and gas sector from drone strikes last year at more than 100 billion rubles ($1.2 billion), and above a trillion rubles once lost profit and indirect damage are counted.