Ukraine drones black out all of occupied Sevastopol. Balaklava power plant was target
A large-scale Ukrainian drone attack on energy infrastructure in occupied Sevastopol left the entire city without electricity overnight on 24 June, the Russian-installed head of the city Mikhail Razvozhayev said, according to his Telegram channel Crimean Wind.
The Balaklava thermal power plant—one of Crimea's key electricity-generating facilities—was the primary target of the strike, according to monitoring channels. The scale of damage to the plant is still being assessed, the Crimean Wind Telegram channel reports, which tracks developments on the occupied peninsula.
"As a result of the attack on our energy infrastructure, the city was temporarily left without electricity," Sevastopol's occupation head, Mikhail Razvozhaev, wrote. He added that residents would be updated as repairs progressed and urged them to conserve phone battery charge.
Explosions across the peninsula
Eyewitnesses and monitoring channels reported a series of powerful explosions across Crimea throughout the night. Blasts were heard in Bakhchysarai, Kerch, and near Mount Ai-Petri, where a radar station of a radio-technical battalion of Russia's Aerospace Forces is located, the Crimean Wind channel reported.
The night attack followed a preemptive move by occupation authorities: on the evening of 23 June, Oleg Kryuchkov, an adviser to the Russian-installed head of annexed Crimea, announced rolling blackout schedules for the peninsula. Approximately half of Crimea had already been left without power at that point, according to preliminary reports.
Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces said earlier they had struck fuel storage tanks at the Kerch thermal power plant and a 330/110 kV substation called "Western Crimea," according to their Telegram channel.
A week of strikes on Crimea and beyond
The 24 June blackout was the latest in a series of Ukrainian strikes on Crimean and Russian energy and logistics infrastructure spanning the preceding days.
On the night of 20 June, Ukrainian drones struck the Tyumen oil refinery some 2,000 km from the Ukrainian border, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported.
The following night, the General Staff said the Defense Forces hit an oil terminal in occupied Kerch and Port Kavkaz on Russian territory. The commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert Brovdi, published strike footage on his Telegram channel and addressed residents of occupied territory, apologizing "for the constant alerts, closed bridges/roads, darkness, noise and stress" and advising them to stay away "from military facilities and anything that poses a fire hazard."
On the night of 22 June, drones struck multiple targets in occupied Crimea. The Tavriiska thermal power plant, an FSB border service building in Armyansk, and fuel depots in Feodosiia were reported hit.
The night of 23 June brought strikes on a railway station, an oil terminal, and S-300/S-400 air defense positions in occupied Crimea, the Crimean Wind channel reported. A fire broke out at the Pivdenna railway station in Kerch, and satellite imagery showed several fires on the Kerch peninsula and at Port Kavkaz.
