Photo Shows Charred Hull of Russia's 'Askold' Corvette Hit by SCALP Missile

A photo and video circulating on social media appear to show the charred remains of Russia's new Askold cruise-missile carrier, which officials say was struck during Ukrainian attack on a shipyard in annexed Crimea last week.

Russian Telegram channel Military Informant, which has more than 600,000 subscribers, shared the image on Monday. The channel says it shows the consequences of direct hits by Storm Shadow missiles on the Askold, a Karakurt-class corvette, at the Zaliv shipyard on November 4. Newsweek couldn't independently verify the image's authenticity.

It comes after Mykola Oleshchuk, the commander of Ukraine's air force, said that Ukrainians had targeted the shipyard in the Black Sea peninsula, which was annexed by Russia in 2014. In his post on Telegram. Oleshchuk didn't name the ship, but said Moscow had been keeping one of its most-modern warships, capable of carrying Kalibr cruise missiles, at the shipyard.

Andriy Ryzhenko, a captain in the Ukrainian naval reserve, told Schemes, a project by U.S.-funded Radio Liberty, that, according to his information, on November 4, "in Kerch, at the time of the explosions, there was only one ship capable of carrying Kalibr missiles, namely Askold."

"You can see that (the ship's) still afloat, but the upper part of the ship is significantly damaged," Ryzhenko said, referring to satellite images released by California-based global-imaging company Planet Labs that appear to show the aftermath of the strike on the vessel.

Russia's Defense Ministry said that one of its warships was damaged in the attack without elaborating, but added that its forces allegedly shot down 13 of 15 cruise missiles fired by Ukraine.

The photo circulating online appears to show the ship's blackened and charred hull, while a video appears to show the moment the warship was hit by a missile.

Military analyst Ian Matveev said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the video shows French SCALP or Storm Shadow missiles hitting a small warship at the shipbuilding plant.

Ukraine's Southern Command spokesperson Natalia Humeniuk said on Sunday that his country's attack in annexed eastern Crimea last week caused "significant" damage to the Russians.

"As for the strike on the Kerch shipyard, the aftermath has not yet been fully verified, but we are talking about the fact that the strike was powerful, successful, and absolutely legitimate, since these are assets that ensure the enemy's combat capability," Humeniuk said on national television.

She added that, while Ukraine doesn't yet have a full report on how badly damaged the missile carrier is, "based on the pictures we've seen, the damage is quite significant."

"This means that the carrier will definitely not come back to service any time soon," Humeniuk said.

Newsweek has contacted Russia's Defense Ministry via email for comment.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has vowed to reverse Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea, and attacks on the peninsula are growing in intensity. Ukraine in September launched a cruise-missile strike on the Crimean port of Sevastopol, damaging Russia's Minsk, a Ropucha-class landing ship, and the Rostov-on-Don, a Kilo-class attack submarine.

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