An explosion collapsed major portions of a bridge connecting Crimea with the Russia mainland, marking a major blow to President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine.
At least three people were killed in the explosion, including a man and woman driving across the bridge at the time, Russian officials said. No details were provided about the third victim.
While the roadway is still navigable, the blast early Saturday downed parts of the Kerch Strait road and rail bridge, which Putin opened himself in 2018. In the years since, Ukrainian officials have threatened to destroy it.
The 12 mile-stretch, a $3.6 billion project and Europe’s longest bridge, looms as a symbol of Putin’s tangible hold over the region.
Russia forcibly annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, much like the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions this year.
The speaker of Crimea’s Kremlin-backed regional parliament immediately accused Ukraine of being behind the explosion. Some celebrated its destruction, but Kyiv stopped short of claiming responsibility. Leonid Slutsky, head of the foreign affairs committee in the lower house of Russian parliament, said “consequences will be imminent” if Ukraine is, in fact, behind the blast.
Russian lawmakers have since called for Putin to declare a “counterterrorism operation” in response to the bridge bombing.
Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee said a truck bomb caused seven railway cars carrying fuel to catch fire, resulting in a “partial collapse of two sections of the bridge.” Putin has since ordered a “government commission” to examine the Kerch bridge “emergency” in Crimea, according to Russian state media TASS.
Surveillance cameras along the bridge captured the moment the explosion occurred, with two vehicles, a truck and a car at the center of the blast. It shows flames entirely overtake portions of the roadway, chunks of which plummeted into the waters below.
“As soon as the fire is extinguished, it will be possible to assess the extent of damage to the bridge and pillars, and it will be possible to talk about the timing of the restoration of traffic,” Sergey Aksenov, the Russian-appointed Head of Crimea, said.
Train and automobile traffic over the bridge was suspended with rail service set to resume later Saturday night.
In wake of the explosion, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced that the air force chief, Gen. Sergei Surovikin, would be the commander of all Russian troops fighting in Ukraine. It marked the first official appointment of a single commander for the entire Russian force in Ukraine.
Surovikin was previously placed in charge of Russian troops in southern Ukraine.
The explosion comes a day after Putin’s 70th birthday.
Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, tweeted a video with the Kerch Bridge on fire along with a clip of Marilyn Monroe’s famous rendition of “Happy Birthday Mr. President.”
With News Wire Services
