In his evening address on Monday, President Volodymyr Zelensky congratulated Ukraine’s Armed Forces (AFU) for destroying the Askold, one of Russia’s Kalibr cruise missile carriers, over the weekend.
“I thank everyone who ensured the successful destruction of the Russian ship at the Kerch shipyard,” Zelensky said in his evening address, two days after a Ukrainian commander announced news of the airstrikes on the Zalyv shipyard in Crimea, about 2 km southwest of the Kerch Bridge.
The destroyed ship, the Askold, was a relatively new Karakurt-class corvette, a class of warships introduced in 2018, designed for carrying Kalibr or Onyx anti-ship cruise missiles.
According to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), Russia has launched three such Project 22800 Karakurt-class corvettes from the Zalyv shipyard as of 2023. “The Zalyv shipyard is the largest shipyard in Eastern Europe and is likely the main repair facility for the BSF [Black Sea Fleet] in Crimea following a successful Ukraine strike on the Russian state-owned ship repair facility Sevmorzavod in Sevastopol on September 13, 2023,” the ISW wrote.
Photos that began to circulate on social media today show the massive damage sustained by a Russian Navy Karakurt-Class corvette after a reported Ukrainian cruise missile strike on 4 November.
This attack was the second successful cruise missile strike on Russian ships in the Russian-occupied Crimea.
According to reports from the Ukrainian Armed Forces, a Russian naval vessel at the Zaliv shipyard in Kerch was the target of a Ukrainian airstrike. At the time of the attack, it was not definitively known whether the Russian vessel had been destroyed.
Following the explosions, Russian occupants initially claimed that “some debris from downed missiles fell into one of the dry docks.” However, it was only late in the evening on November 4 that the Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed that the Russian Black Sea Fleet ship stationed at the Zaliv Shipyard in Kerch had sustained damage.
In the morning of November 5, the Commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, Lieutenant General Mykola Oleshchuk officially confirmed that Ukrainian military forces had destroyed one of the most modern Russian naval vessels – the missile corvette “Askold,” a vessel known for its capacity to carry Kalibr cruise missiles.
The Zaliv Shipyard is a crucial facility for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, and the loss of such a formidable vessel is a notable setback for Russia’s naval power in the Black Sea region
The destruction of the “Askold” is not only a blow to Russian naval capabilities but also a demonstration of Ukraine’s determination to protect its sovereignty and resist foreign occupation.
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