Shocking footage has emerged of the moment a beach in Crimea was turned into a hellscape as terrified sunbathers fled the shore to escape falling shrapnel from a downed Ukrainian missile this weekend.
Blasts rang out in sunny Sevastopol and on Uchkuevka beach on Sunday, prompting a desperate mass evacuation as parents scooped up children playing in the sand and sprinted for cover. Other clips later showed how injured holidaymakers were carted away from the scene on sunloungers.
At least four people including two children were killed and 153 people were injured in the incident on Sunday, according to Russian reports.
Moscow this week squarely blamed Washington, claiming the explosions were caused by US-supplied ATACMS missiles tipped with cluster munitions that were shot down by air defences.
Russian officials said that the missiles were supplied to Kyiv, aimed and guided by the US military, vowing retaliation.
The US meanwhile acknowledged it had provided Ukraine with weapons to ‘defend its sovereign territory, including Crimea’, but Pentagon spokesperson Major Charlie Dietz insisted that ‘Ukraine makes its own targeting decisions and conducts its own military operations’.
The exact weapons involved in the incident have not yet been verified, and it is not clear whether cluster munitions or just falling shrapnel were responsible for the explosions.
The calm, sunny beach was quickly transformed into a hellscape as explosions rang out
Dozens of blasts were seen tracking along the beach as horrified beachgoers fled the shore
The exact missiles and munitions involved in the incident have not yet been verified
Spray flies into the air as pieces of debris from the shot down missile land in the coast off Sevastopol
Cafe customers dive for cover as explosions are heard just outside the establishment
Four people were killed and more than 150 wounded, Russian officials said
Sevastopol, a Black Sea port city and traditional headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet even when it was under Ukrainian rule, was annexed by Russia in 2014.
It regularly comes under fire from Ukraine, with Mykhailo Podolyak – a top aide to President Volodymyr Zelensky – describing the territory as ‘a large military camp’ containing ‘hundreds of direct military targets, which the Russians are cynically trying to hide and cover up with their own civilians’.
But the toll from Sunday’s attack was unusually high.
CCTV footage captured the moment the shrapnel fell from the sky.
The video opens with a typical beach scene, with people paddling in the shallow water or lounging on the sand. However, the mood quickly shifts, and beach goers are seen running back up the sand away from the water.
It quickly become clear why. Dozens of explosions erupt from the sea, sending plumes of water and smoke into the sky.
A split second later, similar explosions hit the beach, prompting further panic.
There were reports of a lack of air raid alerts ahead of the incident which saw fragments pelt the seaside in Sevastopol, while security camera footage from a nearby cafe showed how customers dove for cover as explosions rang out around them.
Moscow summoned US ambassador Lynne Tracy to the foreign ministry to issue a formal warning following the incident, while Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov yesterday gave a public statement slamming the US for the ‘barbaric’ strike on Sevastopol.
‘The involvement of the United States, the direct involvement, as a result of which Russian civilians are killed, cannot be without consequences,’ said Peskov.
‘Time will tell what these will be.
‘You should ask my colleagues in Europe, and above all in Washington, the press secretaries, why their governments are killing Russian children. Just ask them this question,’ the spokesman for Vladimir Putin said.
Today, Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov chimed in, declaring that ‘the reaction from Washington, the reaction to these atrocities from the European Union shows that they do not disdain any methods, including methods of terror, for their illusory attempts to inflict a strategic defeat on the Russian Federation in every sense’.
Meanwhile, Pentagon spokesperson Patrick Ryder expressed concern over the reports of civilian casualties, but said the US did not bear responsibility for any civilian deaths.
‘I would ultimately refer you to the Ukrainian side to talk about their operations. As you know, they make their own decisions regarding operations and selection of targets.
‘We made it very clear that we do not want civilians to die,’ Ryder said, but added: ‘If (the Russians) are concerned about the losses of their troops, they should immediately stop this war and return the sovereign territory of Ukraine.’
Two children are believed to have been killed at the beach in Crimea, along with an elderly woman, who was swimming in the sea at the time of the impact.
Wounded tourists are attended to by passers-by on a beach in Sevastopol after the incident on Sunday
People gather round a Russian tourist who was wounded by the downed Ukrainian missile in Crimea on Sunday
Cars parked next to the beach in Sevastopol were also hit by the debris, smashing windscreens
Kyiv’s forces have relied heavily on Western-supplied weaponry since Russia’s invasion more than three years ago.
The military aid has been crucial in allowing Ukraine to hold the Kremlin’s army at bay, with few major changes along the 620-mile front line in eastern and southern Ukraine for many months.
Some Western countries have hesitated over providing more – and more sophisticated – help for Kyiv’s army because of concerns about potentially provoking the Kremlin.
But as Ukraine has at times struggled to hold the line against Russia’s bigger and better-equipped military, Western leaders have gradually relented and granted more support.
Since the outset of the war, the US had maintained a policy of not allowing Ukraine to use the weapons it provided to hit targets on Russian soil for fear of further escalating the conflict.
But the Pentagon said last week that Ukraine’s military is being allowed to use longer-range missiles provided by the US to strike targets inside Russia if it is acting in self-defence.
And Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014 in a move that most of the world rejected as unlawful, had long been seen as a fair target for Ukraine by its Western allies.
