first attack
Tanks holding petroleum products caught fire on the night of May 4 at the Ilsky oil refinery in the Krasnodar Territory. The incident was reported by Governor Veniamin Kondratiev via Telegram, who confirmed the blaze at the refinery’s oil storage facilities in the Seversky district.
The governor stated that a fire in an oil refinery area covering about 400 square meters had been extinguished with the help of approximately 170 emergency responders. Andrey Doroshevsky, the head of the Seversky district, arrived at the site as firefighters brought the incident under control. Initial communications described the fire as resolved after extinguishment.
Russian news agency RIA Novosti cited emergency services sources suggesting the fire could have been caused by a drone attack. It was reported that a tank holding diesel fuel contained around 4.5 thousand cubic meters of fuel at the time of the blaze.
A separate law enforcement source later stated that four unmanned aerial vehicles had attacked the refinery, with one drone failing to explode. A Telegram channel named Baza claimed four drones participated in the operation, which allegedly lasted from two to three in the morning. According to that channel, three explosions occurred on the refinery site during the strike. One tank was destroyed and a second tank, 85 percent full of diesel, caught fire. The total volume of the affected tanks was reported as 5000 cubic meters.
Preliminary information indicated that there were no casualties as a result of this attack.
second attack
Nearby the Rostov region, reports from Governor Vasily Golubev indicated that a drone struck the Novoshakhtinsky refinery. He noted via Telegram that there were no casualties and that the refinery sustained only minor damage. The facility continues to operate normally following the incident.
The Novoshakhtinsky Oil Refinery is located in the Krasnosulinsky District near the city of Novoshakhtinsk. Golubev stated that the drone impacted the overpass linking workshops, after which an explosion occurred. The fire that followed was extinguished promptly, and company services managed the response without the involvement of external firefighters. No injuries were reported and structural damage was deemed insignificant.
At present the plant is functioning normally again. In 2022, the same refinery was targeted by UAVs on June 22, resulting in a fire that covered about 50 square meters. No one was harmed in that incident, according to emergency services.
Attack the previous day
On the eve of the latest events, a drone operation struck a petroleum tank in the village of Volna in the Temryuk district of the Krasnodar Territory, near Crimea. Video footage suggested multiple drones participated in the attack. The fire area covered about 1,200 square meters, and five fire trains were deployed to control and extinguish the blaze. The tank was declared extinguished by the end of May 3 after extended firefighting efforts.