2023-05-30 17:49:37
image source, Getty Images
Several residential buildings in the southwest of Moscow were affected by the remains of some of the eight drones that were launched against the Russian capital.
Moscow woke up startled on Tuesday by a wave of large-scale drone attacks, the responsibility of which the Kremlin blamed on Ukraine.
The Russian authorities have confirmed that their anti-aircraft defenses shot down eight aircraft early in the morning before they hit their targets and that they They left no casualties or significant damage..
However, the Russian press claimed that some 30 remote-controlled aircraft participated in the operation.
“This morning the Kyiv regime launched a terrorist attack with unmanned vehicles in the immediate vicinity of the city of Moscow, but all the vehicles were shot down“, affirmed the Ministry of Defense in a statement, reported the agency Reuters.
From the Kremlin they also blamed their neighbor to the west and asserted that the events were a reprisal for the previous bombardment of a headquarters of the Ukrainian secret services.
From the government of Volodymyr Zelensky, for its part, They denied any responsibility for what happened..
The Pentagon spokesman later said that “the United States does not support attacks inside Russia.”
A good fright
“At 6:24 this morning I heard an explosion in the distance and the windows of my house shook,” said Steve Rosenberg, a BBC correspondent in the Russian capital.
Despite the fact that the drones were shot down (three thanks to electronic measures that allowed them to be diverted and another five destroyed with Pantsir missiles, according to information provided by the Russian Defense Ministry), the mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, confirmed that some residential buildings were affected.
“As a consequence of a drone attack minor damage occurred to several buildings. All the city’s emergency services are at the scene of the incident,” the local president wrote on his Telegram channel, the BBC Russian service reported.
The BBC verified that three apartment towers were affected when the remains of the downed planes fell on them.
Sobyanin also reported that two people had to be hospitalized, while hundreds more were evacuated preventively for a few hours.
For his part, Deputy Alexander Khinshtein, a member of the ruling United Russia party, said three of the planes were shot down over the exclusive suburb of Rublyovka, west of the Russian capital.
High officials have residences in this area, including President Vladimir Putin.
Witnesses cited by the Russian service of the BBC reported that other drones fell in three areas: in the famous Leninsky Prospekt -the great avenue designed by the Soviet leader José Stalin-, in Profsoyuznaya and in Atlasnaya, the latter off the highway that surrounds the Russian capital.
image source, Getty Images
Putin considered that the Russian defense system worked correctly, despite the fact that the drones managed to reach the capital.
Action and reaction
Despite the fact that the objectives of the devices are unknown, the Russian president assumed that the plan was to “attack and intimidate” his compatriots.
“A Ukrainian military intelligence headquarters was attacked two or three days ago and in response, the Kyiv regime chose to scare the Russians“He added in statements to local television.
During his speech, the president stated that “the anti-aircraft defense system worked normally and satisfactorily, although we need to make some adjustments“.
According to Russian officials, the drones went undetected and shot down long before reaching the capital because they were flying so low.
image source, Telegram
A Muscovite managed to capture one of the drones that were shot down over the city.
clearing up doubts
The initial versions that claimed that the attack was led by Ukrainian-made UJ-22 drones were called into question by some recordings that circulated hours after the attacks on social media.
In the footage made by Muscovistas of one of the downed drones, it can be seen that its silhouette is different from that of Ukrainian aircraft.
The BBC showed the images to Steve Wright, a drone expert at the University of the West of England, who said the wingspan of the wing suggests its potential range is “at least tens, even hundreds of kilometres”.
image source, Getty Images
Drone debris fell on some of Moscow’s tall residential buildings, damaging their facades and destroying some of their windows.
Ukraine rejects the accusations
The attacks on Moscow come as Kyiv experienced its third day of bombing that forced thousands of its residents to spend the night in bomb shelters.
Although they did not hide their happiness at what happened in the capital of the neighboring country, the Ukrainian authorities denied being directly involved in the events.
“Of course we are happy to observe and predict an increase in the number of attacks. But of course we we have nothing directly to do with this“Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said.
Suspicions that the Ukrainian armed forces are behind the attacks on Russian soil only increase as they are repeated.
image source, Getty Images
Despite the fact that the attacks did not leave victims or considerable damage, they caused a huge deployment of the Russian authorities.
At the beginning of the month, drones were shot down over the Kremlin, the seat of the Russian Presidency. A few days later, border towns with Ukraine suffered attacks and land incursions.
From the beginning of 2023 The BBC has recorded some thirty attacks with drones on Russian soil or in areas of Ukraine controlled by Putin’s army.
The doubts have been reinforced in the last few hours by statements such as those of the mayor of Kyiv, Vitaly Klitschko.
“If the Russians can give the people of Kyiv nightmares, because the Muscovites should they rest?“, he released in statements to Ukrainian television.
“For a long time the war in Ukraine seemed something distant to Muscovites, something that was only seen on television and had no impact on their lives. But this will cause concern,” Steve Rosenberg predicted.
image source, Getty Images
Thousands of Kyiv residents have had to spend a third night in the shelters, due to a new wave of attacks launched by Kremlin forces.
Another night at the shelter
For their part, in Kyiv thousands of people had to spend their third sleepless night in shelters due to a new wave of Russian attacks.
The Ukrainian military claimed that its anti-aircraft defenses intercepted 20 drones.
However, one person died and three others were injured, after remains of one of these devices hit a residential building and a fire broke out.
But the capital was not the only target of the Kremlin’s attacks. An air base in the Khmelnitsky province, in the west of the country, was affected. Five planes and the facility’s runway were damaged, local authorities confirmed.
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