A major Russian oil and gas production platform in the Caspian Sea has halted production after a first-of-its-kind Ukrainian drone attack, multiple news outlets reported Thursday, citing Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU).
According to Bloomberg, Reuters and the Kyiv Independent, at least four long-range drones hit the Filanovsky rig, halting output from more than 20 oil and gas wells operated by Russia’s second-largest oil company Lukoil.
“This is Ukraine’s first strike on Russian infrastructure related to oil production in the Caspian Sea,” an SBU source told CNN.
Kyiv has not officially claimed responsibility for the attack.
Lukoil has not commented on the reported drone strikes 700 kilometers (435 miles) from the border with Ukraine.
The Filanovsky rig is one of the largest in the Russian section of the Caspian Sea with a production capacity of 120,000 barrels of oil per day, or 6 million tons per year.
Independent Russian news outlet Astra, citing an anonymous Russian Emergency Situations Ministry source, reported that the Ukrainian drones attacked the Filanovsky platform on Monday evening.
Russia’s Defense Ministry reported downing one Ukrainian drone over the Caspian Sea on Monday afternoon and has not reported any interceptions in the region since.
Lukoil discovered the oil field in 2005 and launched production in 2016.
The rig is part of a larger Lukoil complex with estimated reserves of 129 million tons of oil and 30 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Much of which is transported to the Black Sea via the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC), which has been targeted by several Ukrainian drone strikes in recent months.
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