Ukrainian Drone Swarms Target Four Russian Refineries In Major Attack

Brent crude futures were flat on Friday amid rising geopolitical tensions in Eastern Europe, which seems counterintuitive as escalating war risks could result in supply disruptions.

In the overnight hours, four refineries in southern Russia were targeted, with one facility damaged, in one of the largest drone swarm attacks since the war in Ukraine began, Bloomberg reports.

Seventy drones were intercepted and destroyed over Crimea and the Black Sea and 43 over the Krasnodar region, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Telegram, without saying how many drones took part in the attack. The Afipsky, Ilsky, Krasnodar and Astrakhan refineries were attacked, Ukraine’s General Staff said later in a Facebook post.

In the Seversky district of the Krasnodar region, where the Afipsky and Ilsky refineries are located, “administrative buildings were damaged on the territory of an oil refinery” as a result of the attack, local governor Veniamin Kondratyev said on Telegram. Interfax earlier reported that a fire affecting area of ​​50 square meters (538 square feet) was extinguished by morning, with two people injured. -BBG

Ukraine’s military claimed responsibility for the drone swarm attack, saying it launched drones against “the Afipskiy, Ilskiy, Krasnodar and Astrakhan oil refineries.” They also said an intelligence center in southern Russia was targeted.