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| satellite image showing damaged Russian plane at Saky air base in Crimea |
Kiev - A Ukrainian drone blew up an ammunition dump at a Russian airfield near Hvardiiske in Crimea on Tuesday. That's according to Russian media reports. "Plumes of black smoke were seen over the military air base," read a report by Russian media, Kommersant, quoted by Forbes Wednesday (17/8/2022).
The Hvardiiske attack coincided with separate attacks on other Russian facilities in Crimea, including a Ukrainian commando raid on a Russian ammunition dump near Mayskoye and came exactly a week after a Ukrainian attack on another Russian airfield on the strategic peninsula, which Russian forces seized in February 2014. in the opening phase of the Russo-Ukrainian war eight years ago.
It was not clear if any of the warplanes flying from Hvardiiske, reportedly 12 Su-24 bombers and 12 Su-25 attack aircraft, were damaged in the attack. The jets support the beleaguered Russian Navy Black Sea Fleet, which is based in Sevastopol in Crimea.
In any case, the depths of the Ukrainian offensive in southern Ukraine have taken Russian commanders by surprise and even Russian citizens vacationing on the Crimean coast. A record 38,000 cars crossed the new bridge connecting Crimea to Russia on Monday with almost all of them leaving Crimea.
The airfield near Hvardiiske is just north of Simferopol in central Crimea. The front line between Russian-occupied Kherson and the free city of Mykolaiv is 150 miles north of the airfield. So it makes sense that the explosive-laden drone appeared to be on a one-way mission to hit the Hvardiiske base.
The airfield is too far inside Russian lines for Ukrainian manned fighter aircraft to penetrate safely, and too far for Ukrainian ballistic and cruise missiles to reach. Unless of course Ukraine has been secretly developing long-range missiles.
It should be noted that the August 9 attack on Saki, which had the potential to destroy dozens of Su-24 and Su-30 fighters belonging to the Black Sea Fleet, was characteristic of a ballistic missile attack. Namely, a wide and deep crater. Saki is located 120 miles from the front line.