On the night of December 26, the Ukrainian Air Force had a major victory. Commander Oleksandr Oleshchuk announced that a cruise missile strike in the Feodosia area sent the Novocherkassk large landing ship up in flames. He couldn’t help but praise the pilots for their stellar work, and a video capturing the immense explosion quickly went viral.
Social media is buzzing with the theory that the Novocherkassk ship, following in the footsteps of the Moskva ship, might have been carrying a deadly cargo: Shahed-136 kamikaze drones. This could explain the colossal blast that rocked the night. The ship, part of the Black Sea Fleet (currently bolstered by Baltic and Northern fleet vessels), wasn’t new to Ukrainian firepower. Back in March 2022, during a missile attack on russian ships near occupied Berdiansk, the Novocherkassk ship took some hits, but nothing compared to this. Repaired in occupied Sevastopol, it was back in action.
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If the occupiers used the Novocherkassk ship for drone transportation, it likely came directly from russia, like a floating ferry. Bringing them straight from Iran was out of the question – Turkey wouldn’t budge on letting warships from either side through the Straits.
The ship sinking is a major blow to the russian Black Sea Fleet. This valuable asset, capable of deploying hundreds of troops and tons of equipment, is gone. Its absence will certainly hamper their amphibious operations.
Built in Poland during Soviet times, the Novocherkassk (Project 775) ship saw the light of day in 1987. Interestingly, it spent nearly two decades mothballed before rejoining the active fleet in 2007. This veteran ship boasted a standard capacity for its class: 4,080 tons, 112.5 meters long, 15 meters wide, and capable of carrying 87 crew members, up to 300 troops, and 460 tons of cargo.
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