Largest Yandex Data Center Hit in Kaluga, Russian Media Report

A Yandex data center in Kaluga, Russia, was damaged in a Ukrainian drone attack on October 9, with several modules completely knocked out of service.

Russian news agency TASS reported the incident, citing a statement by Yandex.

According to the company, some of its services may experience disruptions. The extent of the damage is still being assessed.

Kaluga region governor Vladislav Shapsha had earlier reported a nighttime drone attack on the region. However, he did not specify which infrastructure facilities had been damaged.

The data center is located in the Grabtsevo Industrial Park in Kaluga. According to Yandex, it was designed to be the largest of the company’s data centers in terms of total server rack capacity and one of the biggest in Russia. The project called for more than 3,800 server racks, each with a load of 15 kW.

The facility covers 130,000 square metres and has a designed capacity of 63 MW. Construction of the data center began in 2022, and the first phase was commissioned in December 2023. In September 2024, the LLC Engineering Center of Energy reported completing construction of a substation to supply power to the facility.

Militarnyi previously reported that Planet Labs satellite imagery confirmed significant destruction of Yandex’s data center in Sasovo. The images show damage to part of the main building’s roof and the aftermath of a fire. The facility has a stated power capacity of up to 12 MW and is designed to house tens of thousands of servers.