An attack involving dozens of Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) sparked a fire at an oil terminal in St Petersburg and targeted a data centre on the outskirts of Russia’s second-largest city, local authorities and a company whose facilities were hit said on Saturday.

Overnight, Russian air defences shot down 126 drones in the Leningrad region, which surrounds the city, local governor Aleksandr Drozdenko said in a post on Telegram.

In St Petersburg itself, the Ukrainian attack caused fires at “civilian infrastructure” sites in three districts, as well as at the site of the St Petersburg Oil Terminal, the city’s governor, Aleksandr Beglov, said.

“For security reasons, restrictions have been imposed on operations at Pulkovo Airport”, the international airport serving the city, he added, stating that no casualties had been reported.

Meanwhile, the Russian social media platform VK said in a statement that a data center in the Leningrad region had been attacked by drones, adding that its services continued to operate normally.

Situated on the Baltic coast, St Petersburg and the surrounding region are home to significant oil infrastructure essential to the trade in hydrocarbons. This sector has been regularly targeted by Ukraine in recent months in retaliation for Russian bombardments.

In June, the St Petersburg oil terminal was attacked by Ukrainian drones on the opening day of a major economic forum attended by numerous Russian and foreign officials.

Since the beginning of October, the Ukrainian military has also struck several data centers, most of them belonging to technology giant Yandex.

US President Donald Trump has urged Kyiv to halt its strikes on Russian oil refineries, which he says are contributing to higher oil prices and increased fuel costs at petrol stations.

Last Sunday, Trump unilaterally announced an energy ceasefire between Moscow and Kyiv. However, after suspending its attacks for several days, Ukraine announced on Thursday that it was resuming strikes on refineries, accusing Russia of never having halted its own attacks.

Massive drone attack on Moscow as well

Russian air defence forces shot down nearly 200 Ukrainian drones heading towards Moscow on Saturday, 17 October, according to the Russian capital’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin. The large-scale attack disrupted air travel, with two of the city’s airports temporarily suspending operations.

In a series of posts on Telegram, Sobyanin said that a total of 195 Ukrainian drones had been intercepted and destroyed over a 24-hour period as they approached Moscow. He added that emergency response teams were working at locations where drone debris had fallen to assess the situation.

Flights temporarily suspended at two airports

Russia’s federal civil aviation agency, Rosaviatsiya, announced the temporary suspension of flights at Domodedovo and Vnukovo airports because of the situation caused by the attack.

Russian air defence operations against Ukrainian drones heading towards Moscow and the wider surrounding region are frequent. However, the number of unmanned aircraft that Russian authorities said they had shot down on Saturday was considered unusually high.