Russia: Drone Strike Sparks Fire at Novokuibyshevsk Petrochemical Plant

Strike drones hit a Russian petrochemical plant in the city of Novokuybyshevsk in the Samara region on April 23.

Astra reported on this.

The facility’s official name is the Novokuybyshevsk Petrochemical Company. Photos released by local residents from the scene show that at least one installation is on fire.

In the morning, the governor of the Russian region confirmed that Ukrainian drones had attacked an industrial facility in the city of Novokuybyshevsk.

According to Exilenova+ preliminary analysis, a unit for producing methyl tert-amyl ether at the plant was likely hit.

The attacked Russian plant

JSC Novokuybyshevsk Petrochemical Company is part of Rosneft and is part of a large oil-refining and petrochemical complex in the region. The enterprise is one of the largest producers of gas-processing, petrochemical, and organic-synthesis products in Russia and Eastern Europe.

The facility’s processing capacity exceeds 1 million tonnes of feedstock per year, and its product slate includes 30–50 items, including liquefied gases, MTBE (methyl tert-butyl ether), benzene, phenol, acetone, alpha-methylstyrene, and olefins.

In addition, the enterprise is the only producer in Russia of synthetic ethanol and para-tert-butylphenol (PTBP), a product unique to Russia and the CIS countries. It also hosts the country’s only production line for synthetic ethanol.

Ukrainian sources had previously reported that the Novokuybyshevsk Petrochemical Company is one of Russia’s leading enterprises for the production of components used in explosives.

Last June, Ukrainian strike drones had already attacked this plant, which resulted in a fire on its premises.

Today, Ukrainian drones also struck the Gorky oil pumping station in the Nizhny Novgorod region.

On April 18, the Novokuybyshevsk oil refinery in the Samara region was also hit by UAVs of the Ukrainian Defense Forces. As a result of the attack, a fire broke out on the plant’s premises.