Ukraine Uses Drones To Damage Crucial Russia-Crimea Bridge. Again.

Another embarrassment for the Russian military which had boasted of enhanced protection for the bridge after the last time Ukrainian attacks damaged and closed it. 

This is part of Ukraine's ongoing effort to further challenge Russian logistical efforts to support its troops in occupied Ukraine. JL 

Shaun Walker and Emma Graham-Harrison report in The Guardian:

The Kerch Bridge connecting the Crimea to Russia has been closed after explosions in the early hours of Monday morning killed two people. The heavily guarded road and rail link is among the Kremlin’s most important infrastructure projects, and the only overland link that goes from Russia to occupied Crimea. a section of the road bridge had sheared off and was sloping towards the Black Sea. Russia can send supplies to Crimea through occupied Ukraine, along the coastal highway through Mariupol, beside the Sea of Azov, but this is a longer route and presents a less challenging target for Ukrainian forces.  “The Kerch Strait Bridge is logistically significant”

The Kerch Bridge connecting the Crimean peninsula to Russia has been closed after explosions in the early hours of Monday morning killed two people and injured a child.

The heavily guarded road and rail link is among the Kremlin’s most important and high-prestige infrastructure projects, and the only overland link that goes directly from Russia to occupied Crimea.

Video published by the pro-Kremlin Crimea 24 channel, taken from the adjacent railway bridge, showed a section of the road bridge had sheared off and was sloping towards the Black Sea. There were reports of explosions at about 3am local time, and cars heading for the bridge were stopped early on Monday morning, after the head of the Russian-controlled administration in Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, said there was an “emergency situation” on the 145th pillar of the bridge.

Russia’s transport ministry said the road had been damaged but not the pillars, and did not say what had caused the deaths. Photographs published on Russian Telegram channels showed a car that appeared to have been smashed up near the scene of the explosion. Train services were expected to restart early on Monday, Aksyonov said.

The governor of Russia’s Belgorod region said the two people killed were a couple from the region who were travelling to Crimea with their daughter for a holiday. The daughter was receiving treatment for injuries.

Later on Monday, Russia said it would suspend its participation in a deal to export Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea. The deal, brokered by the UN and Turkey last year, was meant to alleviate a food crisis sparked by a Russian blockade of Ukrainian ports that had frozen millions of tonnes of grain exports around the world, much of it to developing countries. The UK has accused Russia of “weaponising food”. The deal was set to expire on Monday.

Maria Zakharova, a spokesperson for Russia’s foreign ministry, blamed the damage on a Ukrainian attack, calling Ukraine “a terrorist state structure”.

Asked about the explosion on Monday morning, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate quoted a previous statement by the directorate’s head, Kyrylo Budanov, saying: “The bridge is a superfluous structure.”

Ukrainian media outlets cited unnamed sources suggesting the Ukrainian domestic security service, along with the navy, had been responsible for the attack. Some reports suggested underwater drones may have been used.

If the damage was caused by an attack, it would be the second time the bridge has been sabotaged. It follows a coup attempt by the Wagner mercenary group last month amid reports that senior field commanders are being removed from their posts in Ukraine.

A ferry service linking Crimea with Kuban, in the Russian region of Krasnodar, has also been halted, the Russian Tass news agency reported.

The bridge, a much-hated symbol of Russia’s occupation of Crimea, was built on Putin’s orders and inaugurated by him in 2018. It is a key link for bringing troops, equipment and supplies to Moscow’s invasion force in Ukraine.

Moscow has in the past boasted of layers of protection, ranging from the latest weapons systems to military dolphins. In October 2022, the day after Putin’s 70th birthday, a massive explosion destroyed a section of the Ukraine-bound road and engulfed the rail link in flames.

Kyiv did not initially claim that attack, but earlier this month, the deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar marked 500 days since Russia’s invasion by acknowledging in a Telegram post that Ukraine was behind the truck bombing “to break Russian logistics”.

 

After it was repaired, Putin drove a Mercedes across the bridge to Crimea, underlining how important he considers the project.

Russia has repeatedly threatened to pull out of the grain deal, citing attacks on its assets in Crimea and its Black Sea fleet. Following the October attack on the bridge, Putin said Russia would close the humanitarian corridor if the Kremlin determined that the explosives used in the attack had been smuggled on ships protected by the grain deal.

The 19km (12-mile) bridge is the only direct land link between Russia and Crimea; ferries are slower and, when winter weather hits the Black Sea, can be unreliable.

The road and railway bridges run parallel, with a wide suspension span in the middle to allow ships to pass through. It has been a supply route for food, fuel and other supplies for Russian troops invading southern Ukraine, and for the naval base at Sevastopol port, the base of Moscow’s Black Sea fleet.

When the bridge is closed Russia can still send supplies to Crimea through occupied Ukraine, along the coastal highway through ruined Mariupol, beside the Sea of Azov, but this is a longer route and presents a less challenging target for Ukrainian forces than the heavily guarded bridge.

“The Kerch Strait Bridge is a logistically significant object,” George Barros, an analyst with the US thinktank the Institute for the Study of War, wrote on Twitter after the first reports of explosions on the bridge.

“Russia will only have one ground supply line – the coastal highway on the Sea of Azov – to sustain (or evacuate) its tens of thousands of troops in occupied Kherson & Crimea if UKR manages to degrade/destroy the bridge.”

The bridge has also been the main route used by Russian civilians heading to Crimea for holidays, apparently undeterred by a string of Ukrainian attacks on Russian military targets there, including an airbase and naval vessels.

Crimea has always been popular with Russian tourists. Visitor numbers rose after the invasion of Ukraine in 2022 made it harder for them to travel to western countries, and Moscow’s propaganda machine doubled down on the historically inaccurate claim that Crimea had been Russian for centuries.