Photo: ZN
On the eve of the incident, the U.S. State Department had expressed concern over attacks on the port.
On the evening of March 1, explosions were reported in Novorossiysk, a city in Russia’s Krasnodar region, with a fire breaking out near an oil terminal that has been targeted multiple times by Ukrainian drones.
Russian media said the strike involved both sea drones and UAVs. The facility is located roughly 345 kilometers from the front line in Ukraine. Earlier, Mayor Andrey Kravchenko announced traffic restrictions near the waterfront.
The terminal was previously hit on November 14, 2025, when Ukrainian drones struck the Novorossiysk commercial port. It is Russia’s second-largest oil export hub and a key logistics point for petroleum shipments through the Black Sea. That attack damaged two oil berths, loading equipment, pipelines, and pumps, triggering a large fire and temporarily halting port operations.
In December, after Ukrainian underwater drones known as Sub Sea Baby reportedly struck a Project 636.3 Varshavyanka-class submarine capable of launching Kalibr missiles, Russian forces blocked the entrance to the naval harbor in Novorossiysk with barges.
In late February 2026, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Olha Stefanishyna, said the State Department had complained after that earlier strike, arguing Ukrainian forces had damaged infrastructure linked to a pipeline transporting American, Kazakh, and Russian oil from Kazakhstan to the Black Sea port.
