Ukrainian Drones Kill 5 in Russia, Hit Wildberries Warehouse
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- Ukrainian drones killed at least 5 people across Russia overnight, striking a Wildberries warehouse in the Samara region roughly 800 kilometers from the border, where a fire broke out but no casualties were reported at the site.
- Russia's Defense Ministry said air defenses shot down 635 Ukrainian drones overnight, including over occupied Crimea and the Black and Azov Seas, though the ministry did not say how many were launched.
- Russia counter-attacked Ukraine with 133 drones overnight, with 24 hitting targets per the Ukrainian air force; separate Russian strikes on Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv killed at least 2 more civilians, including one in a residential building hit by a guided bomb.
- Kyiv's Wildberries campaign has struck over a dozen of the retailer's depots since July 18, beginning in Elektrostal and Tambov, killing at least 9 people and wounding scores across western and southern Russia and Russian-held Crimea.
- Ukrainian strikes on Saratov and Engels killed 2 in a residential building in the Saratov region; both cities are frequent targets — Engels hosts a military airbase, while Saratov is home to a large oil refinery.
- Bashkortostan's Ufa repelled a large-scale drone strike on industrial facilities per Gov. Radiy Khabirov, while a separate strike in the Udmurt Republic killed 3 civilians and wounded 2.
Why it matters: Ukraine has systematically degraded Russia's largest e-commerce infrastructure, striking over a dozen Wildberries depots in under two weeks and killing at least 9 — a tangible cost imposed on Russia's civilian economy as part of Kyiv's stated campaign to make Russians feel the consequences of the Kremlin's invasion.
