Another storage tank exploded at an oil terminal in Russia’s southern city of Rostov-on-Don late Tuesday, as a fire sparked by a drone attack continued to burn for a fourth day, monitoring channels reported.
The blaze at the Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery’s terminal has spread to eight of its 12 storage tanks, the independent news outlet Astra reported. The Ukrainian monitoring channel Supernova+ said another tank exploded late Tuesday.
Footage from the site showed tanks engulfed in flames beneath columns of black smoke. The local Telegram channel Rostov Glavny reported a bright flash on the city’s left bank at 11:50 p.m. Tuesday.
Drones struck the terminal, formerly known as Yug Rusi, in Rostov’s Zheleznodorozhny district overnight on Oct. 10. NASA’s FIRMS satellite monitoring system detected a fire at the site.
Authorities had not announced that the blaze had been extinguished as of Wednesday morning.
The terminal’s storage tanks have a combined capacity of 60,000 cubic meters. The facility can handle 3.5 million metric tons of petroleum products a year, loading sea and river tankers for export. It has also been used to supply fuel to the Russian military.
Separately, Rostov region Governor Yury Slyusar said the region came under a large-scale drone attack overnight Wednesday. More than 160 drones were shot down over the city of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky and eight districts, he said, without providing information on casualties or damage on the ground.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had ordered his military to halt strikes on Russian oil refineries from Oct. 11 at U.S. President Donald Trump’s request as part of an “energy ceasefire.”
Moscow has yet to confirm that it is observing the arrangement. The strike that sparked the terminal fire preceded the announced halt.
This article was translated with the help of artificial intelligence and was reviewed by a Moscow Times editor before publication. Learn more about our newsroom’s AI policy here.
Read this article in Russian at The Moscow Times’ Russian service.
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