A major explosion and fire has torn through a Russian factory which makes engines for Vladimir Putin‘s tanks and armoured vehicles.
Dramatic footage shows the moment the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant, which is in the Ural mountains close to the border with Kazakhstan, goes up in flames.
Locals reported a powerful ‘explosion’, and footage taken by passersby shows a fireball rising high into the sky as the factory burns.
The precise cause of the inferno is not yet known, although key Russian installations have repeatedly been hit by sabotage or kamikaze drone attacks.
Chelyabinsk would appear out of range for drones from Ukraine but a criminal probe has been launched into the precise cause of the explosion.
The huge explosion at the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant lit up the night sky late on Sunday
The light from the blast was so bright it overwhelmed cameras which were pointed at the factory
Footage shows flames rising high into the air at the factory, which makes engines for tanks and armoured vehicles in the Russian army
Dramatic video shows the moment a huge fireball is created by an explosion at the plant
It is not known if anyone was injured or killed in the explosion at this time
Footage taken by passers-by shows emergency services including fire engines at the scene
The cause of the explosion has not yet been revealed, with Russia blaming a ‘short circuit’ as the preliminary reason
The plant is under US and Ukrainian sanctions as ‘an enterprise specialising in the production of diesel engines for military equipment for the needs of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation’.
It is a key supplier for a range of key military firepower such as the T-72, T-90 Proryv tanks, the BMPT Terminator, Akatsiya self-propelled artillery units, and the Msta-S and Koalitsiya-SV complexes.
The initial Russian explanation was a transformer explosion caused by a ‘short circuit’.
However, a short circuit is used to explain any fire at a key installation in Russia and the authorities routinely play down fires at key facilities during the war.
The plant is currently used to repair military equipment for use in Putin’s war against Ukraine, it is understood.
Local sources said later that the fire was under control but it was unclear to what extent the blaze had impacted on the plant’s work.
The destruction came a day after Ukraine launched a major kamikaze drone attack on Russia in their heaviest onslaught for months.
Three of Moscow’s international airports – Vnukovo, Domodedovo and Zhukovsky – were closed with flights suspended or cancelled due to the attack.
The city’s mayor Sergei Sobyanin complained of a ‘mass attack’ on the Russian capital.
The attacks come one day after the heaviest strikes on Kyiv by Putin kamikaze drones since the start of the war 22 months ago – when 71 out of 75 Iranian-made Shahed UAVs were downed by Ukrainian air defences.
Russia was forced to shoot down 11 drones overnight and another nine early this morning.
In Tula, one hit a residential building as it crashed to the ground – with dramatic footage showing the moment of the explosion.
Three people, a man and two women, required medical help and people were evacuated from the building.
Wires caught fire close to the centre of Moscow during the attack today
Ukraine has launched a major kamikaze drone attack on Russia in their heaviest onslaught for months
A drone was seen in the sky in Tula, Russia, 115 miles south of Moscow
A building was left partially destroyed after the drone attacks on Russia
Three people, a man and two women, required medical help and people were evacuated from a building
Russia was forced to shoot down 11 drones overnight and another nine early this morning
A window is left severely smashed after today’s drone attack on Russia
Later in the morning a new drone swarm was reported in Tula, a region where Putin crony and former bodyguard Alexei Dyumin is governor, and once saved the dictator from being savaged by a brown bear.
‘Loud explosions’ were reported over the city. ‘It flew right over us,’ said one local amid unconfirmed reports of two kamikaze drones being shot down.
And a mysterious fire ignited an elite Mosfilmovskaya Street in Moscow, blocking all traffic according to state media reports.
‘The circumstances of the incident and information about the victims are being clarified,’ reported Astra media outlet which suggested an ‘electrical’ inferno.
In the Moscow region, surrounding the capital, five drones were reportedly shot down in Naro-Fominsk, Odintsovo, Ramensky and Podolsk urban districts.
In three cases there was damage to buildings on the ground. It was not immediately clear if any of the drones had hit strategic targets.
More drones were downed in Kaluga, Bryansk and Smolensk regions as Ukraine responded to the onslaught on Kyiv a day earlier.
Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the main target was Moscow. ‘A mass drone attack was attempted overnight,’ he said.
Elsewhere power was cut in the Russian-occupied Donetsk People’s Republic after an apparent Ukrainian strike on the region’s power grid.
Putin-appointed occupation leader Denis Pushilin said: ‘At night, the enemy tried to damage the region’s energy system.
‘Unfortunately, due to the massiveness of the attacks, not everything was shot down.’
Parts of Donetsk city and Makeevka plus almost all of Mariupol were without power.
The Russian attack in Kyiv on Saturday was the most intense of the war.
Serhiy Popko, head of the capital city’s administration, called it ‘the most massive air attack by drones on Kyiv’.
‘Our soldiers shot down most of the drones. Unfortunately, not all,’ said Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky.
‘But we continue to work to strengthen our air defence and shoot down more.’
Overnight another nine Iranian drones were launched by Russia on Ukraine.
Eight were reportedly shot down.