Drones hit oil pumping station and petrochemical plant in two Russian oblasts: fires reported – photos

Iryna Balachuk - 23 April, 08:24

Fire at the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia. Photo: Astra

Fires have broken out at the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast and at a petrochemical plant in Samara Oblast following drone attacks on Russia on the night of 22-23 April.

Source: Astra, a Russian media outlet; Samara Oblast Governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev; Kremlin-aligned Russian news agency RIA Novosti

Details: Early in the morning, residents of the town of Kstovo reported explosions and a fire. Astra said the Gorky oil pumping station in the village of Meshikha in the Kstovo district of Nizhny Novgorod Oblast had caught fire.

The Gorky station is one of the largest hubs in the Transneft Upper Volga system and is part of Russia's main oil pipeline network.

Fire at the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia.

Photo: Astra

Fedorishchev reported that there had been an attack on Samara Oblast.

Quote: "Our region is under attack by enemy drones. Early reports indicate that people have been injured in strikes on industrial facilities in Novokuibyshevsk."

Details: Fedorishchev added that morning school classes have been postponed to a later session in Samara and Novokuibyshevsk.

Astra reported that the Novokuibyshevsk petrochemical plant had been targeted, where a fire is raging.

Fire at the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia.

Photo: Astra

The Novokuibyshevsk Petrochemical Company is one of the largest producers of gas processing, petrochemical and organic synthesis products in Russia and Eastern Europe, manufacturing liquefied hydrocarbons, MTBE, benzene, phenol, acetone, alpha-methylstyrene and olefins.

According to the company's website, the plant also operates production facilities for para-tert-butylphenol that has no equivalent within Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as well as the country's only synthetic ethanol production line.

RIA Novosti, citing Russia's Defence Ministry, claimed that air defence systems had downed 154 Ukrainian drones overnight over Astrakhan, Belgorod, Bryansk, Volgograd, Voronezh, Kursk, Nizhny Novgorod, Rostov and Samara oblasts as well as over temporarily occupied Crimea and the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.

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