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Ukrainian Drone Strike Halts Russia’s Largest Oil Refinery in Omsk
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The Omsk oil refinery, Russia's largest, has halted processing after a Ukrainian drone strike, two industry sources told Reuters on July 7.
The strike landed on July 6. It ranked among Ukraine's longest-range attacks of a war now in its fifth year, the outlet reported. The plant, deep in Siberia, is Russia's top gasoline producer, and its shutdown is likely to deepen nationwide fuel shortages.
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Anatoly Seryshev, the representative of Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Siberia, confirmed the damage in a statement on July 7. "Facilities at the Omsk oil refinery were damaged as a result of the attack. No plant personnel were injured," he stated.
Seryshev noted that a damage assessment was underway and that restoration crews had been mobilized, without specifying how the refinery's operations were affected. According to Reuters, Gazprom Neft, which owns the plant, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
According to the two sources, a crude distillation unit, CDU-10, caught fire and was damaged. The unit accounts for roughly 38% of the plant's capacity and can process 24,580 metric tons a day.
A second primary unit, CDU-11, was also shut down, according to the sources. It was not struck directly, but network links vital to its operation were damaged.
CDU-11 handles about 37% of the plant's capacity, or 24,000 tons of oil a day. It entered service in 2023 and could restart in the near future, according to the sources.
Omsk has stopped selling gasoline and diesel on the Saint Petersburg International Mercantile Exchange since July 7, according to exchange data.
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The plant processed 22 million tons of oil in 2024, or around 440,000 barrels a day, according to source-based figures cited by Reuters. That output included 5 million tons of gasoline and 8 million tons of diesel—volumes now at risk while the two main units stay offline.
The shutdown followed the first known strike on the plant a day earlier. Ukrainian long-range drones reached the Omsk refinery on July 6, marking the first time Russia's largest oil facility had been hit.
The drones flew roughly 3,000 kilometers to strike the ELOU-AVT-11 crude processing unit, which has a design capacity of 8.4 million tons a year. The attack set off multiple fires, making Omsk the last of Russia's 11 largest gasoline-producing refineries to be targeted.
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