Ukraine just hit Russia with its biggest drone strike in weeks
3 hours ago · 6 October 2026Share
Ukrainian marines demonstrate fly eye recon drone capabilities during exercise Sea Breeze 26 in Romania, June 2026. File photo. U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Jackson Wanous · Public domain
Russia says it shot down almost 900 Ukrainian drones overnight.
That's across multiple Russian regions, occupied Crimea and the Sea of Azov. All before dawn today.
So who says so? Russia's Defence Ministry. And Sergei Sobyanin, the Mayor of Moscow.
Sobyanin says 650 of those drones were flown at the Moscow region overnight. 105 were shot down as they got close to the city. Another 68 came down in daylight this morning.
Unconfirmed reports say a fuel depot in the Moscow region caught fire after the attack. Two people are reported dead.
Now, this fits a pattern. Ukraine has spent months hitting Russia's oil refineries and fuel depots. The goal is simple: choke off the fuel running Russia's war machine.
Ukraine says that, as of last weekend, it had knocked out 51% of Russia's oil refining capacity. That figure has not been independently verified.
But the pressure on Russia's fuel supply looks real either way. Vladimir Putin, Russia's President, said last week that Ukraine's strikes have already cost Russia roughly 1% of its gross domestic product.
The Kremlin has banned diesel exports because of the damage. That pushed up diesel prices around the world. It's also why Donald Trump, the US President, publicly asked Ukraine to stop hitting Russian refineries.
And Russia did not stop attacking Ukraine while all this was happening.
Mykhailo Semikin runs the regional military administration in Zaporizhzhia. He says Russia hit a bridge over the Dnipro River there, and traffic across it is suspended.
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Cape Kazantip on the Kerch Peninsula defines the southern shore of the Sea of Azov and the east extension of the Crimean Peninsula. File photo. ISS Expedition 23 crew · Public domain
An overnight strike on a residential building in the same city wounded five people. A daylight strike on a warehouse started a large fire.
Russian forces also hit Ukraine's Odesa region overnight. They struck an ammunition depot, a bulk carrier docked at Chornomorsk port, and port infrastructure in Izmail.
Serhiy Koretskyi, Ukraine's Prime Minister, says eight regions were attacked overnight, including Kyiv. At least 10 people were hurt. One person, a Turkish citizen, was killed.
And now Ukraine is bracing for something bigger.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine's President, says Ukraine has new intelligence showing Russia is preparing a massive strike. He says quote "we are preparing a response".
Zelenskyy also says Russian forces hit hospitals in Kramatorsk and Kryvyi Rih in the past 24 hours.
So what else is Russia sitting on? Zelenskyy said two days ago that Russia has up to 700 ballistic missiles in reserve. He says it's producing 130 to 140 more of them every month. That number comes from a single report and hasn't been confirmed anywhere else.
Here's what nobody can check independently. Russia's Defence Ministry and the Moscow Mayor are the only sources for the 900, 650, 105 and 68 drone figures. No other outlet has verified them separately.
The damage to the Moscow-region fuel depot hasn't been confirmed by Russia either. And the final death toll from that strike isn't known.
So here's the shape of this war right now. Ukraine keeps hitting Russia's fuel supply. Russia keeps hitting Ukraine's cities, ports and hospitals. And both sides say they're about to do more of it.
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