Mystery blasts at Russia airbases as Moldova hit by stray missile
Two mystery explosions at air bases in Russia have killed three people and damaged long-range bombers, as Ukrainians braced themselves for a fresh wave of missile attacks across the country.
A fuel tanker exploded, killing three and injuring six in an airfield near the city Ryazan, south-east of Moscow, local media has reported, while in a separate incident, there was an explosion at an airfield in the Saratov region, allegedly damagingtwolong-rangetu-95aircraft. Both bases are hundreds of kilometres from the Ukrainian border.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, drove a truckacrossabridgelinkinghis country to the Crimean Peninsula following its repair from a bombing in October that had embarrassed Moscow.
The unexplained blasts come as another stray missile from theconflicthaslandedinathird partycountry.theweaponwas found by a police patrol in the Briceniregioninmoldova,close to the border with Ukraine, a statementfrommoldova’sinterior Ministry said – the second time the war has encroached onto Moldovan soil. In October, a stray missile shot down byaukrainiananti-aircraftsystem landed in a Moldovan bordervillage,damaginganumber of houses.
The incident occurred just weeks after two people were killed on a farm near the village of Przewodow in southeastern Poland after a missile strike went off course.
On Monday, power outages hit citizens in Ukraine, includinginkyiv,whileresidentswere
told to shelter underground and air raid sirens sounded as further missile attacks on cities were expected. Moldova also announced blackouts in swathes of the country, due to attacks on infrastructure targets in neighbouring Ukraine. Although Moldova now receives up to 90 per cent of its energy from Romania, its grid is tied to Ukraine's, and power blackouts occur due to theautomaticdisconnectionof stations from the grid in order
to prevent damage to the network. The office of President Volodymyr Zelensky said three rocketstrikeshithishometown of Kryvyi Rih in south-central Ukraine, killing a factory workerandinjuringthreeotherpeople.
Officials in Kherson, which was formerly occupied by Russia,butwasliberatedbyukrainian forces last month, said the region was shelled 46 times on Sunday alone. Russian forces retreated to the opposite side
of the Dnipro river, from where they have since been attacking the city.
In a Telegram update, deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, wrote: "During the day, the occupiers shelled the region 46 times with mortars,tanks,artilleryandmlrs".
He added that apartments and private buildings were "destroyed" in Kherson.
Meanwhile, in the northeastern region of Kharkiv, one person was killed in strikes by S-300missilesoncivilianinfrastructure in the town of Kupyansk, it said.
Ukraine has not formally commented on the Russian airfield incidents, however presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak appeared to refer to the reported incidents in a tweet.ukrainianmediareported last week that Tu-95 aircraft hadbeenspottedinitsairspace.