The Russian Defense Ministry said that explosions at an ammunition depot in the Crimea near Dzhankoy were a sabotage, TASS reports citing a statement from the department. The "head" of Crimea Sergey Aksyonov said that a regional emergency regime had been introduced.
As a result of the “sabotage”, a military warehouse was damaged, as well as damage to civilian facilities, including “power lines, a power plant, a railway track and a number of residential buildings.” According to the Defense Ministry, there were no serious injuries.
The “head” of the region also said that the scene was cordoned off, more than three thousand people were evacuated from the settlements of Maiskoye and Azovskoye. There are 121 people in temporary accommodation centers, the rest went to visit relatives.
Earlier, Aksenov said that due to damage to the railway in the Dzhankoy district, passenger trains coming from the mainland are stopped at the Vladislavovka station. There, passengers are transferred to buses for "delivery to the nearest bus stations." According to the interlocutor of TASS, the railway track was damaged between the stations "Azovskoye" and "Razezd 10th kilometer". Three trains carrying 2,000 people have already been detained.
The explosions became known on the morning of August 16, the Crimean authorities and the Ministry of Defense announced the "detonation of ammunition" in a warehouse in the village of Maiskoye, Dzhankoy district. About 2,000 residents were evacuated from the village. In addition, there was another explosion at the transformer substation, where the fire had already been extinguished. As a result, two people were injured: one was crushed by a wall, the other received a shrapnel wound. Mikhail Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the Ukrainian Civic Chamber , called the explosions "demilitarization in action."