On the night of August 19, a fire broke out in Mariinsk, Russia, in the Kemerovo Oblast of Siberia. The fire occurred in a substation of the Trans-Siberian Railway, which connects Siberia and the Russian Far East with the European part of Russia and is crucial for Russian military logistics.
Mariinsk is located over 3,300 km from Ukraine, so it is unlikely that the fire was started by a Ukrainian drone attack, as their range so far is only 1,300 km. If the fire could be linked to Ukraine, sabotage involving locals is more plausible. The Ukrainian security service SBU has previously carried out operations using explosives against Siberian railways.
“Fire and explosion in a substation of the Trans-Siberian Railway in Mariinsk, Kemerovo region“, read the headline under a video of the fire on the Russian Telegram channel ChK-ORPU.
Fire and explosion in a substation of the Russian Trans-Siberian Railway in Mariinsk, Kemerovo Oblast, more than 3,300 km from Ukraine
The Russian telegram channel Astra reports that a fire engine extinguished the fire overnight and that train traffic came to a standstill for two hours. The transport… pic.twitter.com/x2sONnN6mT
— Euromaidan Press (@EuromaidanPress) 19 August 2024
Another Russian telegram channel, Astra, later reported on the fire in a “Substation of the Krasnoyarsk Railway” Mariinsk, Kemerovo Oblast, was without electricity last night.
“During the night, the fire was extinguished by a fire engine, but the incident resulted in train traffic being halted for two hours.”, wrote Astra.
According to Astra, the traffic prosecutor’s office announced that the preliminary cause of the fire was a “technical fault.”
At the time of publication of this article, no Ukrainian security service had yet claimed responsibility for the attack.
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