Crimea under attack since early morning, major oil facility ablaze
Illustrative photo: Oil depot on fire after morning strikes hit Crimea (https://t.me/mchs_official)
On the morning of October 29, explosions and fires broke out in several areas across the temporarily occupied Crimea. At least one oil depot and, reportedly, a military facility were hit, according to pro-Ukrainian Telegram channel Crimean Wind.
A powerful strike occurred in Hvardiiske at 6:46 a.m. Kyiv time. As a result of the attack, the ATAN oil depot caught fire again — the same one that was previously struck on October 17 and burned for several days.
A few hours later, a monitoring group reported that the new fire at the refinery was visible even from space.
Occupying authorities also complained about a large fire in the area of the Simferopol power station. Later, the channel clarified that the Simferopol Combined Heat and Power Plant (CHPP), formerly known as GRES, was on fire in the Hresovskyi settlement.
"The plant's electric capacity is 100 MW, its thermal capacity is 490.1 Gcal/hour. Its annual output is 600 million kWh of electricity and 300,000 Gcal of heat," the post said.
However, followers of the channel later clarified that it was not the power plant but a nearby oil depot that was burning in Simferopol.
The self-proclaimed governor of Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, officially confirmed the attack by unidentified drones. On social media, he reported that a drone struck a fuel storage tank in Simferopol, triggering a fire.
Additionally, Crimean Wind subscribers reported another possible strike near the village of Krylivka, located close to Myrne settlement. The channel noted that in Myrne, a former airfield now hosts military equipment depots, with Russian air defense positions nearby.
Strikes on Crimea
On October 17, an oil depot in Hvardiiske, occupied Crimea, caught fire early in the morning. Satellite images confirmed two centers of fire at the facility.
Reports at the time suggested that such an attack could severely worsen fuel shortages across the temporarily occupied peninsula.
Later that day, in the evening, Ukraine's Special Operations Forces confirmed they had struck two oil depots in Crimea simultaneously.
