Two people were reportedly killed after the Crimean Bridge, the only link between the annexed peninsula and Russia suffered damage to its spans following a missile attack. The news was reported by Russia’s Transport Ministry on Monday as multiple Telegram channels reported strikes on the bridge and a local official confirmed at least two deaths.
A girl was also injured and was admitted to the intensive care unit of a hospital in the Russian city of Temyuk, Russian news agency RIA reports, citing representatives of the health structure.
“There is damage to the roadway on spans of the Crimean Bridge,” the Transport Ministry said on Telegram.
The spans on a bridge are the lengths between the support piers.
Images showed a partial collapse of a section of the roadway portion of the bridge, which also carries railroad tracks.
On his Telegram channel, Vladimir Konstantinov, head of the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, blamed the damage to the bridge on a Ukrainian attack.
“Tonight the terrorist regime in Kyiv committed a new crime – it attacked the Crimean Bridge,” Konstantinov said.
“The railroad track was not damaged by the strike,” Konstantinov added.
As with previous alleged attacks in Crimea, the Ukrainian government has been opaque in its messaging. But the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) hinted that the Ukrainian government was responsible.
In a statement on Telegram, threaded to an October 2022 post referring to a previous attack on the Crimean Bridge, the SBU said: “Nightingale, my dear brother, The bridge has gone to sleep again. And once… Twice!”
