Drone attack sets fire to Russia's Ust-Luga Baltic oil port, three workers injured

Fire at the Baltic port

A drone attack set fire to the port area of Ust-Luga, a Baltic Sea oil export hub in Russia's Leningrad region, according to Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko, who posted the news on Telegram on 11 November. The port also ships gas, fertiliser and coal, and lies about 150 kilometres from Saint Petersburg, close to the Estonian border and across the Gulf of Finland from Finland. Drozdenko later reported that three workers had been injured and that their lives were not in danger. He also said a power station had been taken out of service, and Reuters reported that an electrical substation had stopped working. Unverified online videos showed several fires and large columns of smoke over the site. The extent of the damage and whether port operations were affected had not been established at the time of reporting.

Air defence claims and alerts

Drozdenko said air defences had shot down 146 drones over the Leningrad region during the night, and a later update put the figure at 150. Those claims have not been checked independently. Ukrainian long-range drones are named as the attackers in several reports, but the governor's statements do not name a country of origin. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia warned of a drone threat on 11 November. Latvia and Lithuania told residents in several regions to take shelter after unidentified drones entered their airspace from Russian or Belarusian territory, and NATO fighter jets were scrambled for air defence. Lithuanian crisis managers said their warning covered Kaunas, the country's second-largest city with about 300,000 residents, and no injuries were reported there. Finland imposed temporary partial restrictions on airspace and maritime traffic in the eastern Gulf of Finland.

Earlier update146

Later update150

Earlier update

146 drones

Later update

150 drones

Data from the article text

Air traffic and wider context

At Pulkovo airport, which serves Saint Petersburg, the airport's website showed more than 18 flights cancelled or delayed on the morning of 11 November. Ukrainian and Russian delegations are holding talks in Abu Dhabi, mediated by the United States, aimed at ending a conflict that has run since 2022. Ukraine has stepped up drone attacks on Russian energy industry over the past 18 months, aiming to cut Kremlin revenue and weaken its capacity to fund the war. Kyiv, for its part, denounces Russian strikes on its own energy network, which raise fears of a winter without heating, running water or electricity for millions of Ukrainians. Ust-Luga had been targeted several times before, and the European Union, Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States and Switzerland have sanctioned the port. The European Commission's directorate-general for enlargement and the eastern neighbourhood described Ust-Luga as one of the Russian ports used to move Russian crude through the shadow fleet and other unregulated, high-risk shipping.

Open questions

Several details were still missing from the reports at the time of writing. The scale of the damage at the terminal and the state of port operations were not described. Reports did not say which facilities the power station or the substation served. The drone counts came from the governor and had not been independently checked.