According to Russian officials, during the night of November 3 and early morning of November 4 (local time), a series of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) attacked deep into Russian territory, targeting many industrial and energy facilities, causing large fires at oil refineries and petrochemical plants and causing many areas to lose power over a large area.
In the Volgograd region, a fire broke out at the Frolovskaya transformer station after a UAV attack.
Governor Andrei Bocharov confirmed that the fire originated from debris from a downed UAV. The incident caused power outages in many areas of Frolovo city and neighboring districts, forcing authorities to issue "UAV risk" warnings across the region.
In Kursk Oblast, more than 16,000 households in Rylsky, Glushkov and Korenovsky counties were without power after a transformer station was attacked, Governor Alexander Khinshtein said. Another transformer station in Belaya village also caught fire, causing 7 residential areas to have complete power outages.
Further east, in the Bashkortostan region, UAVs attacked the Sterlitamak Chemical Plant in the early morning of November 4.
Governor radiy Khabirov said both UAVs were shot down, but the debris collapsed part of the plant's water treatment area. No casualties were recorded. This facility belongs to Roskhim Chemical Group, specializing in the production of raw materials for the industries of oil refining, food, healthcare and plastic.
Meanwhile, in the city of Nizhny Novgorod, another Ukrainian UAV attack caused a fire in the Kstovo industrial park, where the Lukoil-Nizhegorgorgorgortoorgsintez (NORSI) and the SIBUR-Kstovo refinery are located.
According to local sources, the fire broke out at NORSI - one of Russia's largest refineries, with a capacity of 17 million tons per year and a key supplier to the Moscow region. This is also the second time the facility has been attacked, after the incident on October 16.
The Russian Defense Ministry said that the air defense system shot down a total of 85 UAVs in 8 regions, includingvoronezh, Nizhny Novgorod, Belgorod, Kursk, Volgograd, Lipetsk, Bashkortostan and Saratov.
Several airports in Volgograd, Kazan, Nizhnekamsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Penza, Samara, Saratov, Tambov and Ufa also had to temporarily stop taking off overnight.
Ukraine has not yet commented on the series of attacks.
In recent months, Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russian refineries, fuel depots and pipelines to put pressure on supplies, disrupt military logistics and increase costs for attacks.
The Zelensky administration called it a campaign in retaliation for Russian airstrikes on Ukraine's power grid.
