Tuapse refinery strike

Ukrainian drone strikes on Russia’s Tuapse oil hub triggered a refinery and terminal fire that sent smoke over the Black Sea port and coated parts of the city in black residue. (reuters.com) (nytimes.com) Russian officials said Tuapse was hit on April 16 and again on April 20. Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said one man was killed in the port during the April 20 attack and another person was injured. (t.me) (rferl.org) By April 22, firefighters were still battling the blaze for a third day. Reuters reported that the export-focused Tuapse refinery had halted operations after the April 16 strike. (reuters.com 1) (reuters.com 2) The Krasnodar regional operations headquarters said combustion byproducts mixed with rain on April 22 and left a “black coating” on surfaces in Tuapse. The same officials said benzene, xylene and soot concentrations were running two to three times above permissible levels in several neighborhoods. (usnews.com) (iz.ru) Tuapse is a port city of about 60,000 people roughly 80 kilometers northwest of Sochi. Its Rosneft-owned refinery processes about 12 million metric tons of crude a year and ships products including naphtha, fuel oil and diesel. (themoscowtimes.com) Russian regional authorities also said the April 16 attack caused an oil spill. They estimated the contaminated area in the Black Sea at about 10,000 square meters and said containment booms and six port vessels were deployed. (meduza.io) Ukraine has increasingly targeted Russian refineries, depots and ports to disrupt fuel supply and export logistics far from the front. Tuapse stands out because the refinery and Black Sea export terminal are part of the same coastal complex. (reuters.com) (euromaidanpress.com) Russian officials said on April 23 that firefighters had brought the blaze under control. The smoke, the shutdown and the black rain had already turned Tuapse into one of the clearest examples this month of the war reaching deep into Russia’s energy coast. (reuters.com)