Ukraine war: 7 dead after multiple bridges collapse across Russia

Two bridges collapsed in different Russian regions bordering Ukraine overnight, derailing trains and killing at least seven people and injuring dozens, Russian authorities said early on Sunday.

There was no immediate confirmation that the incidents were related, but a Ukrainian partisan group has claimed responsibility for a third incident overnight targeting signalling on a new Russian rail line in occupied Donetsk.

Both Kursk and Bryansk, the regions where the two bridges collapsed, have been subject to frequent attacks by Ukraine during the war that Russia started with its full-scale invasion more than three years ago.

Seven people were killed and 69 injured when a highway bridge collapsed onto railway tracks, derailing an approaching train in the Bryansk region late on Saturday, Russian emergency ministry and regional officials said.

Russia’s Railways initially posted on the Telegram messaging app that the Bryansk bridge collapse was the result of an “illegal interference in the operation of transport”, but the post was later removed. Prominent Russian military blogger Semyon Pegov, who uses the name War Gonzo, called the Bryansk collapse “sabotage.”

Bryansk governor Alexander Bogomaz said on Telegram that 47 people were hospitalised. Three children were among those injured with one in serious condition, he said.

The collapse in the Kursk region occurred early on Sunday while a freight train was crossing the bridge, Alexander Khinshtein, acting governor of the region, and Russian Railways said on Telegram.

“Part of the train fell onto a road underneath the bridge,” Khinshtein said. He added that the locomotive caught fire, which was quickly extinguished. One of the drivers sustained leg injuries, and he and the team operating the train were taken to a local hospital, Khinshtein added.

He posted a photo of derailed carriages on a damaged bridge over a road. Andrei Klishas, a senior member of the Federation Council, Russia’s upper chamber of parliament, said on the Telegram messaging app that the incident in Bryansk shows that “Ukraine has long lost the attributes of a state and has turned into a terrorist enclave.”

Russia’s Baza Telegram channel, which often publishes information from sources in the security services and law enforcement, reported, without providing evidence, that according to preliminary information, the Bryansk bridge had been blown up.

We’re getting more detail on the second bridge collapse in Russia’s Kursk region – hours after a similar incident in Bryansk.

The Kursk bridge collapsed while a freight train was passing over it, the acting governor of the Russian region bordering Ukraine said on the Telegram messaging app.

Unlike with the Bryansk incident Russia isn’t reporting any deaths in Kursk, but its governor Alexander Khinshtein said one of the freight train’s drivers was injured.

A pro-Ukraine partisan group has reportedly claimed responsibility for sabotaging a railway in Donetsk Oblast, which disrupted Russian logistics.

The Atesh partisan group issued the statement on Telegram this morning while two bridges collapsed, causing two trains to derail in Russia’s border regions.

The group said it destroyed a relay box on the new Volnovakha-Mariupol railway, which resulted in the disruption of the railway signalling and traffic control system, The Kyiv Independent reported.

The Volnovakha-Mariupol railway, recently built by Russian forces, was used by Vladimir Putin’s troops to deliver fuel, equipment, and ammunition directly to the frontline.

Another bridge has collapsed in Russia, causing a train to derail, the governor said, in what appears to be a coordinated attack on Russian rail infrastructure.

Earlier this morning, at least seven people were killed and 30 hospitalised after “illegal interference” caused a bridge to collapse and a train to derail in Russia’s Bryansk region that borders Ukraine.

Russia has beefed up its military offensive across Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, and Sumy oblasts, Ukraine’s commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said.

Vladimir Putin’s troops “have notably increased activity in the Zaporizhzhia direction, where they are conducting active offensive actions,” he said.

The commander added that Ukraine’s military was inflicting substantial losses on Russian troops, with over 34,000 Russian soldiers killed in May.

Hundreds of towns were under evacuation orders in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region where Russian forces are focusing their attacks, as Kyiv officials warn it could be preparing a new offensive.

Mandatory evacuation orders were issued for 11 settlements yesterday, bringing the total number of villages under such an order in Sumy to 213.

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky said that there is no clarity on Russia’s position ahead of the upcoming peace talks in Turkey.

Mr Zelensky, in his evening video address, said: “We don’t have it, Turkey doesn’t have it, the United States doesn’t have it, and neither do our other partners”.

“At this point, it looks far from serious.”

The Ukrainian president previously accused Russia of “doing everything it can” to ensure that a next potential meeting between the two sides brings no results.

Ukraine has not yet confirmed whether it will attend proposed talks in Istanbul on Monday.

At least seven people were killed and 30 hospitalised after “illegal interference” caused a bridge to collapse and a train to derail in Russia’s Bryansk region that borders Ukraine, Russian authorities said this morning.

The train’s locomotive and several cars derailed “due to the collapse of a span structure of the road bridge as a result of an illegal interference in the operation of transport,” Russian Railways said on Telegram.

Two children were among those hospitalised, one of them in a serious condition, according to Alexander Bogomaz, the governor of the Bryansk region.

Among those killed was the locomotive driver, Russia’s state news agencies reported, citing medics.Russia’s ministry of emergency situations said its main efforts were aimed at finding and rescuing victims, and that some 180 personnel were involved in the operation.

Russia’s Baza Telegram channel, which often publishes information from sources in the security services and law enforcement, reported without providing evidence that the bridge was blown up.

Since the start of the war that Russia launched more than three years ago, there have been continued cross-border shelling, drone strikes, and covert raids from Ukraine into the Bryansk, Kursk and Belgorod regions that border Ukraine.

The train was going from the town of Klimovo to Moscow, Russian Railways said. It collided with the collapsed bridge in the area of a federal highway in the Vygonichskyi district of the Bryansk region.

The district lies some 100km from the border with Ukraine.

Ukraine’s air defence units were trying to repel a Russian air attack on the capital Kyiv, mayor Vitali Klitschko said this morning.