Moscow was hit by drones Tuesday morning, in what appeared to be the first attack on residential areas of the Russian capital since the invasion of Ukraine and a dramatic display of the Kremlin’s war increasingly coming home.
The incident caused damage to some buildings in Moscow and forced residents to evacuate homes, local officials said.
It comes weeks after an alleged drone attack on the Kremlin itself and following days of deadly Russian bombardment against civilians in Kyiv, as events far from the front lines take the spotlight ahead of Ukraine’s planned counteroffensive.
The Russian defense ministry said in a statement Tuesday that eight “aircraft-type” unmanned aerial vehicles were involved in the alleged attack on Moscow. All drones were destroyed, it added.
Three were jammed and lost control, the ministry said, and the other five were shot down by the Pantsir-S anti-aircraft missile system in the Moscow region.
The ministry blamed Ukraine for what it called a “terrorist attack.”
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said that his country “has nothing directly to do” with the drone attacks on Moscow. Ukraine is, however, “pleased to observe and predict an increase in the number of attacks,” he said in a YouTube interview Tuesday.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said that drone attacks had “caused minor damage to several buildings.” In a series of posts on the Telegram messaging app, Sobyanin said two people “sought medical attention” and there were no serious injuries.
He added that “for safety reasons” some residents were evacuated from some parts of the two affected buildings while emergency services were working on the scene.
Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the Moscow region, said in a message on Telegram that “several drones” were shot down on approach to Moscow.
Photos and video shared on Russian social media appeared to show a drone flying over the town of Il’inskoe in the western Moscow region, and smoke and the sound of an explosion in the village of Romashkovo in the same area.
Vorobyov said residents in the region could hear sounds of explosions Tuesday morning that he said were air defense systems working. “I ask people to remain calm,” he added.
Russian authorities said an investigation had been launched into the drone attacks.
State news agency Tass reported that all airports in Moscow and the wider region were operating normally. The agency also reported that a woman received a “light shrapnel wound” after her residential building in southwest Moscow was hit by a drone.
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