Deadly Overnight Attack Hits St. Petersburg Oil Facilities

At least one person was killed overnight when an attack struck two oil facilities in St. Petersburg.

Governor Alexander Beglov said crews were extinguishing fires at the St. Petersburg Oil Terminal and the Ruchyi oil depot following the attack, which also injured at least five people.

A logistics center belonging to Ozon—known as Russia’s Amazon—and a data center belonging to VKontakte, the country’s Facebook equivalent, were also hit.

Kyiv has not yet commented on the strikes. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday morning that Russia had targeted Ukraine’s energy sector 76 times since Donald Trump declared an “energy ceasefire” last week.

Ukraine had paused its strikes on Russian oil facilities—which it says are meant to limit Moscow’s main war revenue—for three days after the announcement, while accusing Russia of continuing its own attacks.

Kyiv resumed strikes earlier this week, drawing criticism from Trump, who has called for a truce to facilitate a diesel supply deal he struck with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Ukraine has struck St. Petersburg before, though regions closer to Ukraine are threatened more often. The city’s oil terminal was last hit in July.

Russia’s defense ministry said it shot down more than 1,000 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory overnight into Sunday.

St. Petersburg’s governor said 12 apartment buildings and two homes were damaged in the attacks, while Pulkovo Airport was temporarily closed.

He also warned that mobile internet service disruption was possible.

Social network VK confirmed a drone had targeted its regional data center, but stressed its services remained available “as usual” after users reported outages in the early hours of the morning.

Ozon also confirmed its local logistics center had been targeted by a drone, sparking a fire.

It said staff were evacuated and no one was injured, and that it was not accepting shipments from sellers at the location “as it is currently serving other operational purposes.”

Beyond numerous oil facilities across Russia, Ukraine has also mounted strikes aimed at disrupting the Russian economy more broadly. Earlier this month, it launched a series of attacks on Yandex, Russia’s largest search engine, that led to service disruptions.

Relations between Washington and Kyiv have frayed since the U.S. struck a controversial deal to import Russian diesel in hopes of lowering U.S. energy prices, which have skyrocketed during the Iran war, ahead of the midterm elections.

Zelensky suggested the deal amounted to the U.S. investing in Russia’s war effort.

Trump’s decision to temporarily suspend a raft of sanctions against Russia has drawn fresh criticism, including from some U.S. Republicans.

However, on Sunday, Zelensky said on Telegram that he had spoken with Trump’s top negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

He said their teams are in constant communication and preparing the next diplomatic steps.

Both Russia and Ukraine have been striking each other’s energy infrastructure with increasing intensity ahead of winter, as Moscow’s full-scale invasion drags on into its fifth year.

Russia says it hits targets used by Ukraine’s military, though the UN noted on Friday that the first two weeks of October had been the deadliest for Ukrainian civilians in years.

Russian strikes on energy facilities have left hundreds of thousands without power, raising concerns about civilians enduring another freezing winter.

Zelensky said on Saturday that tens of thousands of people remained without power. Russia launched nearly 2,700 drones, 1,700 aerial bombs, and 66 missiles in the past week, most of which were aimed at energy facilities, he said.

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