Ukraine Drone Strikes Tuapse Refinery Spur Spill Cleanup
Ukrainian forces hit the Tuapse refinery with three drone strikes over the past couple of weeks, and the second attack left a trail of oil, smoke, and black rain on Russia’s Black Sea coast. The refinery, one of the largest in Russia, burned for two days after April 16 and for five days after April 20.
The attacks spread petroleum into the Tuapse River and the Black Sea. Authorities sent more than a dozen boats to clean up the slick at sea, while booms went up on beaches and volunteers worked with animals covered in oil.
Tuapse coastline cleanup
Sergei Solovev, a cleanup volunteer, said he arrived in Tuapse to find the area coated in residue. “I saw train carriages covered in residue from the black rain and animals. It’s all very toxic,” Solovev said. “And the smell was oily.”
Solovev also said, “It’s an environmental disaster,” and described oil across a 20-kilometre radius. “There’s oil already all over the coastline within a 20-kilometre (12-mile) radius. It’s all still not being cleaned up; it’s all covered in oil. All the soil needs to be removed, a huge amount of this muck, all covered in rocks in hard-to-reach places, which you can’t even get to with equipment.”
Residents were told to stay indoors, keep windows shut, and leave home wearing a mask. Cleanup crews and volunteers set up animal cleanup centres for cats, dogs, and birds as the slick moved along the shoreline.
Smoke, soot, and air readings
After the April 20 strike, analysis of the air around Tuapse found benzene, xylene, and soot at three times above safe levels. At least eight storage tanks were destroyed by the end of that attack, adding to the damage at a site targeted to hurt Russia’s oil industry.
Local volunteer Elena Lugovenko said, “The rain covered all the cars and animals.” She added, “All the animals are covered in oil. Volunteers have set up animal cleanup centres.”
Black rain is an unnatural weather phenomenon in which water droplets are darkened by soot and ash before falling. The sight has been recorded in places including Hiroshima in 1945, Tehran more recently, and Kuwait in 1991 during the Gulf War.
With oil still spread across beaches and hard-to-reach rocks, the practical task now is removing the muck before it reaches more of the Black Sea coast. The immediate work in Tuapse is not another strike, but clearing what the three drone attacks already put on the ground and in the water.
