In his evening address on Monday, President Volodymyr Zelensky congratulated Ukraine’s Armed Forces (AFU) for destroying the Askold, one of Russia’s Kalibr cruise missile carriers, over the weekend.
“I thank everyone who ensured the successful destruction of the Russian ship at the Kerch shipyard,” Zelensky said in his evening address, two days after a Ukrainian commander announced news of the airstrikes on the Zalyv shipyard in Crimea, about 2 km southwest of the Kerch Bridge.
The destroyed ship, the Askold, was a relatively new Karakurt-class corvette, a class of warships introduced in 2018, designed for carrying Kalibr or Onyx anti-ship cruise missiles.
According to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), Russia has launched three such Project 22800 Karakurt-class corvettes from the Zalyv shipyard as of 2023. “The Zalyv shipyard is the largest shipyard in Eastern Europe and is likely the main repair facility for the BSF [Black Sea Fleet] in Crimea following a successful Ukraine strike on the Russian state-owned ship repair facility Sevmorzavod in Sevastopol on September 13, 2023,” the ISW wrote.
On Nov. 4, the AFU conducted missile strikes on the shipyard in the occupied Crimean port of Kerch. At the time, Ukrainian Air Force commander Mykola Oleschuk wrote on Telegram that the shipyard was “where one of the most modern ships of the Russian Navy was stationed” – a ship capable of carrying powerful supersonic Kalibr missiles.
Zlimness on November 7th, 2023 at 00:16 UTC »
A friendly reminder how Russia commented on this when the strike happened two days ago:
Yeah, 'fragmentation somewhere in the drydock' huh. That bitch took a direct hit. Not too shabby accuracy.
It's also worth noting this isn't far from the Kerch bridge and Ukraine got through with at least 3 missiles without being intercepted by Russian air defenses. If you can hit a ship in a dry dock, probably not too hard to hit a bridge.
mitchsn on November 7th, 2023 at 00:08 UTC »
Destroying Russian naval vessels is the biggest bang for the buck. With the current state of their economy they'll never be able to replace them any time soon and it's incredibly embarrassing for them!
panzerfan on November 6th, 2023 at 23:49 UTC »
It's a corvette, but rather heavily armed with 8x Kalibr or Oniks anti-ship cruise missiles, on top of Pantsir and dual purpose gun. Good to see the crippling of the Kerch shipyard drydock, if only just for a few months due to this corvette's destruction.