Russia's T-72B3M Tank Eliminated in Bakhmut Drone Strike: Video

Ukrainian drones have taken out a Russian main battle tank around the destroyed Donetsk city of Bakhmut, new footage appears to show.

In a clip shared by Yuriy Fedorenko, the commander of Ukraine's Achilles drone company within the country's 92nd Assault Brigade, on Tuesday, a first-person-view (FPV) drone barrels directly for what looks to be a Russian T-72B2 tank. The feed then cuts as the drone hits the tank, before the video cuts to a clip of what appears to then be the smouldering remains of the vehicle.

The Achilles company "destroyed an enemy T-72B3 tank worth $3.5 million," Fedorenko said in a post accompanying the video, adding that Ukraine's multipurpose "Wild Hornet" FPV drones were responsible for the damage.

Newsweek couldn't independently verify when and where the footage was filmed, and has reached out to the Russian defense ministry for comment.

In late September, Ukraine's drone tsar and minister for digital transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, said the Achilles strike company had hit a number of Russian T-72 and T-80 tanks, as well as howitzers, in a drone blitz on Russian equipment.

"The Russians lose more than $7 million worth of equipment in one evening," he said in a statement.

The destroyed city of Bakhmut has been under Russian control since May 2023, but Ukraine hasn't given up its efforts to peel back Moscow's grip on the settlement.

Ukrainian forces "repelled 10 attacks" in areas around Bakhmut over the past day, the General Staff of Ukraine's armed forces said in a morning update on Wednesday. Kyiv's fighters are plugging away with assault operations south of the city, the General Staff said, adding they were were fortifying their positions around Bakhmut.

Moscow said on Wednesday that its paratroopers deployed around Artemovsk — the previous name for the city during the Soviet era, before Ukraine renamed it — had destroyed a number of Ukrainian reconnaissance drones around the city.

In a separate statement on Wednesday, Russia's defense ministry said Russian troops operating T-72B3 tanks around the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk had "destroyed camouflaged positions" and killed an unspecified number of Ukrainian troops.

Ukrainian forces near Bakhmut kept up ground attacks on Tuesday, but didn't gain any territory, the U.S. think tank the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said in its latest update. Russia similarly didn't make any confirmed advances from localized operations around Bakhmut, the ISW evaluated.

Ukraine is currently destroying up to 80 percent of Russian equipment around Bakhmut that falls within reach of Kyiv's artillery and drones, the Achilles company's Fedorenko told Ukrainian broadcaster Suspilne on Tuesday.

"A very small percentage of the enemy's equipment has the ability to turn back," he said.

Russian forces around Bakhmut are pouring efforts into regaining lost positions and capturing territory, he added.

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