Damage to Russian Black Sea Ship 'Significant' After Crimea Strike: Ukraine

A Ukrainian attack on a shipyard in annexed eastern Crimea last week caused "significant" damage, a Ukrainian military spokesperson has said.

Ukraine's Southern Command spokesperson Natalia Humeniuk made the remarks on national television on Sunday, commenting on the November 4 strike by Ukraine on the Zaliv shipyard, also referred to as Butoma, in Kerch, which reportedly hit Russian cruise-missile carrier Askold.

Schemes, a project by U.S.-funded Radio Liberty, published satellite images by California-based global-imaging company Planet Labs that appear to show the aftermath of the strike on the vessel, which is armed with a Kalibr strike missile system.

"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," said Humeniuk.

Humeniuk said 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," she said.

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

Retired Ukrainian Navy captain Andriy Ryzhenko told Schemes 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.

The vessel was reportedly undergoing final testing when it was damaged in the strike on November 4.

"The ship hasn't even set sail or taken part in combat yet; it was undergoing some final testing work, so that it could then go to sea and fight against our state," Yuriy Ignat, a spokesperson for Ukraine's air force said during a broadcast on national television on Sunday.

Open Source Intelligence analyst MT Anderson said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the satellite images suggested that, as of November 2, Askold was undergoing sea trials in the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.

The attack comes after 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.

Tensions have risen on the Black Sea peninsula as Ukraine ramps up attacks as part of an offensive that President Volodymyr Zelensky hopes will lead to its liberation. The Ukrainian president has vowed to reverse Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea.

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