Day 1,634 of war: Ukraine strikes rocket and space centre in Samara, oil terminal in Novorossiysk halts operations

Overnight on 15 August, a missile struck an industrial enterprise in Russia's Samara region, confirmed regional governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev, though he did not name the specific facility. The Telegram OSINT channel Exilenova+ identified the target as the Progress Rocket Space Centre, saying the strike hit the plant's main workshop. According to the channel, a fire was still burning at the site as of around 7:00 a.m. Progress designs and manufactures medium-class carrier rockets and also produces automatic spacecraft; to date it has built more than 1,700 carrier rockets and 950 spacecraft.

Oil terminal in Novorossiysk halted

Reuters, citing sources, reported that the Sheskharis oil terminal in the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk stopped operating after Ukrainian drone attacks. Early on 14 August, a tanker due to load oil at the terminal turned around and headed out to open sea over fears of a drone strike. Loading and intake of crude at the terminal were then halted because storage tanks were full. Sheskharis is Russia's main Black Sea oil export terminal, normally handling around 700,000 barrels of crude per day. Its shutdown adds to disruption at the port of Novorossiysk, where three grain terminals were already halted after a drone attack overnight on 12 August.

Russian strike on Dnipropetrovsk region

Oleksandr Ganzha, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration, reported that a Russian strike on an apartment building in the region killed a three-month-old boy, while 11 people were injured, including children aged 5 and 12.

Ukraine's estimate of Russian losses

According to Ukraine's General Staff, Russia's total combat losses from 24 February 2022 to 15 August 2026 reached roughly 1,465,810 personnel, 12,269 tanks, 25,144 armoured combat vehicles, 47,932 artillery systems, 2,026 multiple rocket launchers, 1,568 air defence systems, and 461,484 operational-tactical level drones. Ukraine does not regularly publish its own loss figures.