Seventy-four drones were shot down on approach to Moscow in the early hours of March 11, authorities claimed, marking the largest drone attack against Russia's capital during the full-scale war.
Russia's Defense Ministry claimed its forces had intercepted a massive strike of 337 Ukrainian drones across multiple regions, including 91 over Moscow Oblast, 126 over Kursk Oblast, 38 over Bryansk Oblast, and others over the Belgorod, Ryazan, Kaluga, Lipetsk, Oryol, Voronezh, and Nizhny Novgorod regions.
This is the largest number of drones launched against Russia in a single attack during the entire full-scale war.
The strike took place as Ukrainian and U.S. delegations are about to meet in Saudi Arabia to discuss possible peace terms with Russia. Ukrainian officials are reportedly planning to propose a partial truce that would extend to aerial strikes and naval operations.
"Emergency services are working at the site of the fallen debris," Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said, reporting minor damage to a building in the city. The mayor attributed the attack to the Ukrainian military.
"Today at 4 a.m., a massive drone attack against Moscow and Moscow Oblast began," Governor Andrey Vorobyov wrote on his Telegram channel. Drone wreckage damaged warehouses in the Leninsky district, set fire to 20 cars at a parking lot in Domodedovo, and damaged an apartment building in the town of Ramenskoye, according to the official.
Three people were killed in Moscow Oblast as a result of the strike, Vorobyov claimed. This reportedly included a 38-year-old security guard in the town of Domodedovo south of Moscow and two men who died later in the hospital.
Eighteen others, including three children, were injured in the region, the Health Ministry claimed.
Chris York
The Kyiv Independent could not verify the claims, and Ukraine's military has not yet commented on the attack.
Domodedovo, Sheremetyevo, Vnukovo, and Zhukovsky airports in Moscow introduced temporary flight restrictions in response to the drone attack, Russia's Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsiya) reported.
The Dyagilevo airbase in Ryazan Oblast and an unspecified target in Kursk Oblast were also targeted in overnight drone strikes, claimed Andrii Kovalenko, head of the Center for Countering Disinformation at Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council.
Kovalenko suggested that the strike could be seen as an "additional signal to Putin that he should also be interested in a ceasefire in the air."
Ukraine regularly strikes military and industrial targets deep within Russian territory.
Alisa Yurchenko
