A maritime war that looks like David against Goliath. For several months, the Ukrainian army has been increasing strikes against the Russian fleet using naval drones, such as the Magura drones. The last attack dates back to Sunday April 7, 2024. The missile ship “Serpukhov” which was anchored in the Baltiysk naval base in the Kaliningrad region was reportedly seriously damaged in a fire. The incident was claimed by the Ukrainian intelligence services (GUR), reports The world .
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In detail, the “Serpoukhov” is a Bouïan class corvette. This is the fifth in this series. It is equipped with eight P-800 Oniks anti-ship missiles, but can also carry 3M-54 Kalibr and 3M22 Tsirkon cruise missiles. As detailed 24TV , it can accommodate around thirty people on board, and its missiles have a range of around 1,500 km. Launched in April 2015, the boat was used in Syria in 2016 in the operation to support the regime of Bashar Al-Assad. It was then transferred from the Black Sea Fleet to the Baltic Fleet in 2017.
A series of unrecognized attacks
The fire on board would have made the ship ” out of combat “, completely destroying its communications and automation systems. For the moment, its origin has not been confirmed. But according to several Ukrainian media, including Hromadske , it would indeed have come from a GUR attack. The service has also published images which allegedly show the start of the fire.
The Russian fleet has been damaged several times in recent weeks. On April 7, a fire also affected the icebreaker Ekaterina Velikaya in Vladivostok. The ship was under maintenance in the city’s port. The incident killed one person and injured three others. At the beginning of March, Ukrainian drones attacked the patrol ship Sergei Kotov, off the coast of the town of Feodosia in Crimea, indicates Euronews . The attack killed seven people. In February, they also sank a landing ship and a missile corvette. All these attacks have never been recognized by the Russian army.