Ukrainian Navy Neptune missiles hit the Ionos drone plant and an Aero-Hit repair centre in Rostov-on-Don overnight into November 13, according to Ukraine’s General Staff. Ionos LLC produces tactical-level attack drones and sustained hits to its production facility and storage site. Aero-Hit LLC, which manufactures Veles attack and reconnaissance first-person-view drones at a plant in Khabarovsk, operates the service centre in Rostov-on-Don where crews maintain front-line drones. "Striking production, storage and maintenance facilities means hitting the entire supply chain," the General Staff said. "Some drones will never be manufactured, others have been destroyed in storage, and damaged UAVs will not return to the front line for a long time. Fewer Russian drones mean fewer attacks on our troops and civilians." Rostov region governor Yuri Slyusar confirmed the overnight attack and reported that more than 120 drones were destroyed over Rostov-on-Don and 10 districts in the region. A fire of 20 square metres burned at a production site in the Sovetsky district and a warehouse fire covering 1,500 square metres in the Aksaysky district resulted from falling debris. Slyusar reported one man was wounded and five apartment buildings sustained damage, which forced the evacuation of a five-storey apartment block.
Supply chain disruptions and missile capabilities
This strike marks the third Neptune attack on the Russian military industry in a fortnight. Ukrainian Navy missile forces destroyed two Su-34 aircraft at Marinovka airfield in the Volgograd region on October 29, and the General Staff reported Neptune missiles hit the Proton-Elektroteks plant in Oryol on November 7. The Proton-Elektroteks plant makes modules for Kover cruise missiles and parts for the Iskander-M ballistic missiles Russia fires at Ukrainian cities. Satellite imagery from the Ukrainian open-source group OSINT Varta shows that one production building at the Proton-Elektroteks plant was largely destroyed in the November 7 strike, with its roof brought down. Oryol governor Andrei Klychkov acknowledged only that an enterprise’s production premises were partly damaged. Defence Minister Yevhenii Khmara said Ukraine has struck 12 Russian ballistic missile launchers and that strikes on companies making components for Russian weapons are cutting production. Khmara said these actions allow Ukraine to counter the enemy’s ballistic missile strikes.
| Missile | Reported Range |
|---|---|
| Neptune (Original) | 300 km |
| Neptune (Upgraded) | 1,000 km |
The Neptune missile began as a ground-launched anti-ship weapon and sunk the Black Sea Fleet flagship Moskva in April 2022. It has since been upgraded with a larger payload and a reported range of up to 1,000 km.
Russian drone strikes and energy infrastructure damage
Russia launched 96 strike drones at Ukraine starting from 18:00 on November 13, consisting of 61 jet-powered Shahed-type machines and the rest Gerbera drones or Parodiya decoys, according to the Ukrainian Air Force. Air defences shot down or suppressed 81 of these drones, including 52 jet-powered machines. Strikes on the Lukoil refinery in the Volgograd region on November 12-13 hit crude distillation units, one hydrotreating unit, a loading-and-unloading rack, and six storage tanks. Governor Andrey Bocharov said four employees of the southern industrial zone died and two others were injured during that strike. Russian refinery runs are approximately 30% below late-October levels, and industry sources told Reuters that throughput is at roughly 500,000 tonnes a day against 700,000 tonnes in late October. In the Omsk region, a strike on the Gazprom Neft refinery on November 11 caused one injury, though local reports suggested a heat and power plant might have taken the damage instead of the refinery.
In the Kharkiv region, an explosion of an unidentified device killed a woman aged 60 and injured a woman aged 30 at Karasivka in the Zolochiv hromada. A man aged 34 was also wounded at Chornohlazivka. In the Sumy region, a drone struck a private house in Hlukhiv in the Shostka district, and the same site was struck a second time while police responded. This strike injured a nine-year-old boy and his grandmother, while a police officer was also injured, according to Oleh Hryhorov. In Odesa, the death toll from a November 13 drone strike rose to two, according to Serhiy Lysak.
