Ukraine launched an overnight drone attack on the port of Primorsk — Russia’s largest crude oil terminal — setting fires at the facility and on two tankers and forcing the suspension of loadings for the first time in the war, industry sources and Ukraine’s military told Reuters.
The fires were extinguished and there were no reported oil spills, but two vessels were left ablaze, including one the sources said had a capacity of about 700,000 barrels. Reuters and two industry sources said operations at the northwestern Baltic port, which can load roughly 1 million barrels of crude a day, were suspended after the strike. It was not immediately clear whether loadings had resumed.
Russia’s defence authorities said they intercepted scores of incoming drones; Moscow’s officials later claimed some 221 Ukrainian drones were intercepted overnight. Ukrainian officials described the operation as part of a broader campaign targeting Russia’s energy infrastructure and tankers to reduce Kremlin revenue by constraining exports.
The attack prompted an immediate market reaction: U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude rose 56 cents, or about 0.9%, to $62.93 a barrel on Friday. Analysts and security experts warned that strikes on export infrastructure could reduce Russian crude and refined product shipments if disruptions persist.
Giovanni Staunovo, an analyst at the Security Service of Ukraine, said such strikes “have room to drag down Russian crude and refined product exports,” underscoring Kyiv’s strategic aim to pressure Moscow economically as well as militarily. Kyiv has publicly framed the campaign as a means to compel negotiations to end the conflict.
The Primorsk terminal is a flagship export hub on the Baltic Sea and handles a large share of Russian seaborne crude. Industry contacts said the port loads both crude and significant volumes of refined products, with some facilities capable of moving hundreds of thousands of barrels per day.
The overnight strike came amid other hostilities. Ukrainian officials reported that at least two civilians were killed in the Sumy region when a Russian glide bomb struck a border village. The Kremlin said on Friday that there was a pause in peace negotiations with Ukraine.
This is the most consequential attack on Russia’s oil export infrastructure in months and marks the first reported instance in which a major Russian port was forced to halt loading operations because of a strike. Russia has suffered multiple attacks on its maritime and onshore energy facilities in recent months, but most previous incidents did not shut a major terminal entirely.
Market participants and industry watchers said the immediate disruption at Primorsk could tighten seaborne crude flows from Russia if the suspension continues, potentially diverting cargoes to other terminals or buyers and complicating logistics for already strained global oil markets.
Russian authorities and the port’s operators said they were assessing damage and coordinating cleanup and inspections to determine when normal operations could safely resume. International energy trade monitors and shipping operators said they were tracking vessel movements and waiting for official notifications from Russian regulators and port administrators.
The attack adds to an intensifying cycle of strikes and counterstrikes between Russia and Ukraine as both sides seek leverage. Kyiv’s heightened focus on energy and export targets reflects a tactical shift that analysts say aims to reduce Moscow’s hard currency earnings, while Moscow’s continued attacks inside Ukraine have raised concerns among Western and regional governments about civilian harm and wider instability.
Reuters contributed reporting to this story.