Russia’s ‘Poor Weapons Dealing with’ Wiped Out A lot of 105-Ton Depot: UK

A mixture of poor weapons dealing with and dangerous storage practices seemingly led to the blasts that rocked Russia’s 51st GRAU arsenal in late April, the UK Protection Ministry mentioned on Wednesday.

In an intelligence replace, the ministry estimated that the explosions seemingly resulted within the Kremlin’s largest lack of its personal munitions attributable to its personal troops’ actions for the reason that full-scale conflict in Ukraine started.

“It’s extremely seemingly that poor weapons dealing with procedures alongside negligent storage of munitions resulted on this loss,” the ministry wrote.

“That is in step with a long-standing pattern of repeatedly evidenced Russian ineptitude with regards the protected and correct dealing with of its personal munitions,” it added.

The ammunition depot, about 50 miles northeast of Moscow and within the Vladimir area, suffered a number of explosions after it caught fireplace on April 22.

Although it did not identify the power, the Kremlin had mentioned on the identical day {that a} fireplace at a depot within the Vladimir area brought about munitions to detonate. The Russian protection ministry’s assertion blamed the “violation of security necessities when working with explosive supplies.”

Satellite tv for pc pictures beforehand obtained by Enterprise Insider final month confirmed that the Russian arsenal sustained critical harm, with massive parts of the power affected.

The UK protection ministry mentioned satellite tv for pc pictures confirmed that multiple sq. kilometer of the depot had been broken by the detonations, which prompt “large losses at a key strategic depot supplying Russia’s conflict in Ukraine.”

Footage circulating on social media of the blast additionally appeared to point out secondary explosions within the civilian areas across the ammo depot, which is one among Russia’s largest.

The UK’s protection ministry cited Ukrainian figures that mentioned the 51st GRAU depot held about 105,000 tons of munitions, together with ballistic, air-launched, and air protection missiles.

Andriy Kovalenko, the pinnacle of Kyiv’s Heart for Countering Disinformation, mentioned on the time of the blasts that the depot had additionally saved artillery shells.

The identical depot has seemingly suffered explosive mishaps earlier than. Russian state media reported in June 2022 that 4 folks had been killed by the “spontaneous detonation” of a shell whereas ammo was being loaded and unloaded at a depot within the Vladimir Area.