Oops! Russia Accidentally Bombs Itself, Blames ‘Emergency Release’

Russia blamed “an emergency ejection of an air ordnance” when a dropped bomb caused havoc in one of its own cities, although fortunately according to official accounts say no one was killed.

Scenes of chaos not unlike those visited upon Ukrainian cities by the Russian government were seen in the Russian border city of Belgorod when a bomb fell a little after ten o’clock local time yesterday evening. Buildings were damaged and cars destroyed by the blast.

Yet despite the ongoing war and the obvious intent of the Ukrainian government to take the conflict back to Russia, the blast was not in fact enemy action, but friendly fire.

According to the Kremlin, a passing Su-34 bomber “performing a flight above the southwestern Russian city of Belgorod” — presumably on its way to Ukraine — accidentally dropped its payload. This, Russian state media said, was an “emergency release of an air ordnance” and the national Ministry of Defence said a bomber had “accidentally discharged aircraft ordnance”. They say two people were injured and none killed.

Ukraine reacted to the explosion, implying this was not an accident but may in fact be linked to a deliberate terror campaign by Russia against its own civilians. Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council claimed: “Russia’s occupation army continues provocative shelling of its cities to intimidate civilians and incite escalation.” Ukrainian state media, on the other hand, repeated Russia’s version of events that “a Russian Su-34 fighter jet accidentally dropped a bomb on the city of Belgorod.”

While accidentally bombing your own cities is shocking, accidents are not unknown in the stress and confusion of war. Last year, a rocket struck Poland — a NATO member and not officially party to the conflict — which increased tensions with Russia. Later, it came to be generally accepted that the missile was actually stray ordinance launched by Ukraine’s own air defence system that had found its way into Polish territory. Two people were killed.