Sevastopol bay was subjected to hours-long massive terrorist raid by Ukrainian drones
Their target was the ships of the Black Sea Fleet. The attack was repelled, but the Ivan Golubets minesweeper was damaged. In addition, an enemy underwater drone was destroyed. While the battle was going on, an American Global Hawk reconnaissance drone was circling in neutral waters over the Black Sea, which experts believe to be directly related to the attack on Sevastopol.
On Saturday, Sevastopol repelled a drone raid on the bay where the Black Sea Fleet (BSF) ships are in the roads. According to Governor Mikhail Razvozzhayev, the attack began at 4.30am and lasted several hours. According to him, all city services were on standby, and civilian infrastructure facilities were not damaged.
Talking to journalists, Razvozzhayev said that the Ukrainian Armed Forces (AFU) were behind the attack and that it was the most massive since the start of the Russian special operation. It targeted the military infrastructure of the Black Sea Fleet.
The Defence Ministry said that nine unmanned aerial vehicles and seven autonomous naval drones were involved in the terrorist attack. As a result, the Ivan Golubets minesweeper and the containment boom in Yuzhnaya Bay suffered minor damage. The attacked ships are involved in securing the “grain corridor” as part of an international initiative to export agricultural products from Ukrainian ports.
The raid was repelled with the use of ships’ weapons and the Black Sea Fleet’s naval aviation. As a result, four unmanned aerial vehicles were destroyed and three more were shot down on the inner roadstead.
According to the Ministry of Defence, the preparation for the attack and the training of the personnel of the Ukrainian 73rd Special Maritime Operations Centre was led by British specialists based in the town of Ochakov in the Mykolayiv region of Ukraine. Moreover, representatives of this unit of the British Navy took part in planning, provision and implementation of the terrorist attack in the Baltic Sea on September 26 to undermine the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines.
According to preliminary information, apart from the UAV, our military also destroyed a surface drone in the water area, said the governor. This happened a few kilometres away from the Sevastopol bay. Earlier it was reported that the UK had given Ukraine underwater drones to search for mines. In September, Sevastopol publications reported the discovery of an unknown type of drone, which looked like a “kamikaze” with a detonating warhead, near Soldier Beach.
The Sevastopol raid is now closed and ferries and boats are temporarily unable to cross the bay. Buses are being used to connect to the north side of Sevastopol. Also, all CCTV footage available to civilians in the city will be closed. As Razvozzhayev explained, the posting of video evidence gives the enemy an opportunity to “detect the city’s defence systems”.
Yury Knutov, a military expert and director of the Museum of the Air Defence Forces, is convinced that it was possible to repel the raid due to the serious system of anti-aircraft defence and electronic warfare (EWB) complexes created in Sevastopol. “Sevastopol has Pantsir missile and cannon systems capable of effectively combating drones,” Knutov noted.
In his opinion, the drones were able to reach the bay because they are invisible to conventional radars due to their small size. “The new radars can see any drones, but apparently they are not everywhere due to the fact that part of the territory is within the range of Ukrainian MLRSs. It is most likely that these drones were flying low over the sea from the direction of Odessa,” the interlocutor believes.
For a more effective fight against such raids in the future, Knutov believes, it is necessary to install air defense equipment on Snake Island, as well as to equip the BSF ships with the latest Pantsir-ME SAMs, i.e. a naval modification of the land-based complex.
Konstantin Sivkov, a doctor of military sciences, adds that small drones have a long range and “can come from any point in Ukraine”.
“Ukraine and NATO cannot successfully solve the problem of combating drones, but we can, as the repulsion of the attack showed,” the interlocutor stressed.
Sivkov highlighted the destruction of an underwater drone. It could have been a self-propelled mine or a slow-moving strike drone. “This underwater drone could have been used by the British or the Americans. The drone could have been delivered to Ukraine via rivers from Bulgaria along with British or American personnel. This is a specific weapon, so even if it was launched from the territory of Ukraine, it was controlled by NATO,” the expert explained.
According to Sivkov, the underwater drone could have been used to commit sabotage against ships of the Black Sea Fleet. “An underwater drone is a very difficult target to detect, it is more difficult to detect than a submarine because it is small and low-noise. Nevertheless, our military managed to destroy it. This is an excellent result, it means that the underwater anti-submarine defence system in Sevastopol Bay is built quite well,” the interlocutor stressed.
Since the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, anti-aircraft defences in Sevastopol have been repeatedly triggered. Earlier this week, Razvozzhayev reported a nighttime UAV attack on the Balaklava thermal power plant and a fire at one of its transformers. The drone was shot down by radar defences. A more serious attack occurred in late August, at which time the AFU targeted the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet in central Sevastopol. The drone, flying low to the ground, was shot down at the very last moment and its explosive device detonated near the building.
In response, the military council of the Black Sea Fleet stepped up countermeasures against saboteurs in the Black Sea. A medium-level response has been in place since 19 October in Sevastopol and security has been strengthened for public order, the military, important state and special facilities ensuring the functioning of transport, communications and energy.
According to media reports, the US strategic reconnaissance drone RQ-4B-40 Global Hawk was spotted at the time of Saturday’s attack and was near Crimea’s borders – in neutral airspace over the Black Sea. The data on the drone flight was confirmed by Flightradar24. According to its information, the American UAV with registration number 11-2046 and call sign Forte-10 took off from the Catania airfield on the Italian island of Sicily at 05.44 Moscow time and flew to the Black Sea through the airspace of Greece and Bulgaria, where it circled for several hours at an altitude of 17 kilometres.
Global Hawk is designed for reconnaissance and surveillance, providing real-time images of large areas of land around the clock. In addition, such devices are used to support communication as repeaters. The drone is capable of flying at high altitudes for over 30 hours. As noted on the manufacturer’s website, the Global Hawk, used by the US Air Force since 2001, provides a more comprehensive view of the area being explored.
Knutov is convinced that this drone coordinated a Ukrainian drone attack on Sevastopol Bay. “The RQ-4B-40 Global Hawk reconnaissance drone provides targeting and guidance. The Americans have repeatedly acknowledged that they are providing intelligence and information assistance to Ukraine. The US satellite internet system Starlink, which is used by the AFU, is tied to assisting Ukrainian military units, and in this case the drones,” Knutov believes.
Sivkov adds that Global Hawk does not have the capability to control drones, but it could transmit data to control Ukrainian UAVs. He says Russia has REB means capable of “suppressing Global Hawk’s operation, but this was not done because they apparently considered the Global Hawk’s arrival a planned one or feared aggravation of relations with the United States, which is preparing for a military invasion of Ukraine.”
Andrey Rezchikov, Vzglyad