Frontline report: Ukraine regains control of Black Sea shipping lanes; Russia shoots down own jet

Day 590.

Today, they are a lot of news.

First of all, in the aftermath of the comprehensive amphibious operation combined with marine and aerial strikes, Ukrainians were able to reopen their harbors. And this is one of the questions that many of you were asking in the comment section – if Russians were forced to remove their Black Sea Fleet away from Sevastopol, does this mean that Russians lost their ability to conduct blockade and control the Black Sea?

As it turns out – yes – Ukrainians have organized a safe corridor for commercial ships, Ukrainians have opened all three major Black Sea ports, and the first ten ships have entered Ukrainian waters.

In response, Russian forces started attacking the seaports with kamikaze drones to destroy the cargo that was meant for these ships. Even though 25 Shaheds were shot down, 8 of them managed to hit the facilities. As the recently released footage indicates, the targeted objects were hangars and containers with products for export.

The destruction of infrastructure for exports is one of the strategic objectives of the Russian forces because by reducing Ukrainian exports, Russians are shrinking the Ukrainian economy, which means that Ukrainians cannot finance the military-industrial complex. And this is especially important in the light of recent uncertainty about external help, as the US experiences a government shutdown, and the parliamentary elections in Slovakia were won by the anti-Ukrainian party of Robert Fico.

Several days ago, the Russian Air Force also struck a tank production factory in Kharkiv. Even though Ukrainians have not been using this factory since the beginning of the war simply because it is too close to the Russian missile launchers to be protected, the Russian effort still represents a decisive wish to undermine the Ukrainian military-industrial complex.

After meeting the annual quota for the destruction of military targets, Russians conducted several more strikes. On 6 October, Russians struck the center of the same city with at least two Iskander missiles – residential houses were destroyed or damaged, and [two people were killed], including children.

Another devastating strike happened around 70 km east of Kharkiv City – in the small village of Hroza. Here, Ukrainians were holding a funeral of a soldier from that village. A third of the village attended the funeral, so when Russians conducted an Iskander strike, they wiped out [one-sixth] of the village population in one second, including children.

Russian sources reported that Ukrainians were holding a funeral for an important officer from an all-Nazi battalion and that lots of other high-ranking Nazis attended the funeral. One journalist asked the press secretary for the Russian president about the strike. Even after the released footage showed dozens of scattered bodies of civilian women and elderly people, Dmitry Peskov asserted that Russians never hit civilians.

Several days prior, Russian sources also posted footage of how they dropped a 1500 kg air bomb on a hospital in Beryslav, so the situation with the Russian strikes remains extremely difficult.

From better news, Russians once again shot down their own fighter jet. Today, Russian sources reported that a Russian air defense operator in Mariupol confused the Russian jet with a missile and shot it down. One of the reasons is that today, Ukrainians conducted certain strikes in the area, and it was assumed that Ukrainians are trying to destroy the bridge that connects Crimea to Russia, which is the main supply artery of Russian logistics, so the air defense operators were likely too anxious and did not think twice.

In total, Russians intercepted their jets already 5 times – and this is only from what has been officially admitted – there are still plenty of unexplained accidents in Braynsk, for example, where Russians lost 4 aircraft, or during the Wagner coup, when at least 7 aircraft were shot down. Some Russian analysts critiqued the lack of coordination and said that if this trend continues, Russians will run out of jets.

In order to precipitate this process and protect Ukrainian skies from missiles, Germany announced its plans to provide Ukraine with an additional Patriot system. And this would be especially helpful during winter as the risk that Russians start hitting the energy infrastructure to create societal pressure is extremely high. Hopefully, the system will arrive very soon.

But the biggest news today is that Ukrainians have detected and destroyed a Russian training base near Donetsk. Ukrainian fighters from the Shadow detachment released a video showing how Russians gather at the training camp just 11 km from Avdiivka. Setting up the camp so close was a terrible idea because Ukrainians quickly detected it and hit with HIMARS rockets. As a result, at least 35 troops were killed and wounded.

In our daily frontline report, we pair up with the military blogger Reporting from Ukraine to keep you informed about what’s happening on the battlefield in the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Related: 

• Frontline report: Ukraine commandos raid occupied Crimea, conducting another amphibious landing op
• Frontline report: Russia relocates Black Sea Fleet as Ukrainian threat looms

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