Ukraine launched 70 drones in mass attack on Russian airbase: Budanov

• Ukraine targeted an airbase in Russia’s Rostov region with at least 70 drones, an official said.
• Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine, confirmed the attack to The War Zone.
• The operation targeted Su-34 bombers used by Russia to drop glide bombs on Ukraine.

Ukraine struck a military airbase in Russia with at least 70 drones on Thursday, Lt. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the Defense Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine, told The War Zone.

The mass attack was launched at Morozovsk airbase in Russia’s Rostov region, almost 200 miles from the Ukrainian border.

A satellite image of an airfield close to Morozovsk shows what appear to be multiple Su-34 fighter-bombers.

A security source told Sky News that the Ukrainian attack was designed to target the jets that Russia has used to drop powerful glide bombs on Ukraine.

They added that the strikes were part of a “sustained campaign to degrade the Russian Air Force.”

The extent of the damage caused by the attack is not yet known. Budanov told The War Zone that they were “waiting for information” on whether any targets were destroyed or damaged.

But one Russian Telegram channel, The Kremlin Snuff Box, claimed that six Russian military personnel were killed in the strikes, citing sources in the Russian General Staff.

“Most of the drones were shot down, a few failed. We have six dead, including two military pilots. And more than ten wounded,” one source said, per the channel.

It is not the first time that Ukraine has targeted the Morozovsk airbase.

In early April, Ukrainian forces carried out another large drone assault on the site, destroying “at least six fighter bombers,” damaging another eight planes, and killing 20 Russian soldiers, a Ukrainian law enforcement official told Politico.

A video shared on social media at the time appeared to show the strikes.

Russia has increasingly used glide bombs — some weighing more than 3,000 pounds — to batter Ukrainian targets.

The cheap projectiles are made by attaching wings and satellite navigation systems to old Soviet-era bombs. Russian bombers are then able to release them from safer distances, making it hard for Ukraine to counter such attacks.

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said in March that Russia’s use of the bombs was its “main advantage on the battlefield,” allowing its forces “to destroy the targets of the strikes and advance through the ruins.”