(Reuters) -One person was killed, while two power substations and an oil depot caught fire, after Ukraine launched tens of drones in attacks on several regions, Russian officials said on Tuesday.
The attacks came after Russia blasted the main children’s hospital in Kyiv with a missile in broad daylight on Monday and rained missiles down across Ukraine, killing at least 41 civilians in the deadliest wave of air strikes for months.
Russian air defense systems destroyed 38 drones, including 21 over the southern region of Rostov and seven over Kursk, both of which border Ukraine, the Russian defense ministry said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app.
The total number of drones launched by Ukraine was not immediately clear.
Explosions were heard in the town of Kalach-on-the-Don in Russia’s southern region of Volgograd, said the Baza Telegram channel, which has sources in Russian law enforcement.
In a Telegram post, regional governor Andrei Bocharov said a power sub-station and an oil depot were set ablaze by falling debris from drones destroyed by Russian air defense systems.
The sub-station fire was promptly doused, but firefighters were still battling the fire at the oil depot, Bocharov said.
There were no injuries as a result of the attack, he said, adding, “There is no threat to residential buildings.”
The Russian defense ministry did not list Volgograd among the regions where drones launched by Ukraine had been destroyed.
A man died, two people were injured and several homes were damaged overnight in the Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, its governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram.
Three drones were destroyed over the Belgorod region, the Russian defense ministry said. Ukraine attacks over the past day had killed four people and injured 20, Gladkov said.
A fire broke out at a power sub-station in Rostov was put out after Ukraine launched “tens” of drones overnight, Vasily Golubev, governor of the Russian region, said on Telegram, adding that the fire had been extinguished.
The defense ministry said five Ukraine-launched drones were destroyed over the Astrakhan region and two over the Voronezh region, several hundred kilometers south of Moscow, but there were no details of damage.
Russian officials rarely disclose the full extent of damage inflicted by Ukrainian attacks.
Reuters could not independently verify the Russian reports. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine.
On Monday, Ukraine‘s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy had vowed that Kyiv would retaliate for the missile attack on the children’s hospital.
(Reporting by Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Editing by Michael Perry and Clarence Fernandez)
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