Large plain white cylindrical oil storage tanks stand on a snowy rocky shore beside a long concrete jetty with tall steel loading arms and pipe racks, a low sun glowing under a heavy band of cloud, and calm grey water filling the foreground.

The Port

Drones Set Fire at a Russian Oil Port

Russia said it downed 627 Ukrainian drones overnight, its most in five nights; a governor said drones set fire to Ust-Luga, an oil-export port, injuring three.

UST-LUGA, Russia, Nov. 11 — Russia’s Defense Ministry said its air defenses destroyed 627 Ukrainian drones overnight into Wednesday, and the governor of the Leningrad region said drones had set fire to the port of Ust-Luga, one of the main facilities for Russian oil exports, injuring three workers, the Associated Press reported.

The governor, Alexander Drozdenko, said 150 of the drones had been over his region, around St. Petersburg, according to the AP. The Ukrainian outlet ua.news reported him as saying the injuries were not life-threatening. None of the reports this paper read said whether oil loading had stopped.

The ministry posted its count on Telegram at 9:50 a.m. Moscow time, 1:50 a.m. in New York: “intercepted and destroyed 627 Ukrainian aircraft-type unmanned aerial vehicles,” over 19 Russian regions as well as the Moscow region, the Krasnodar territory, Tatarstan, occupied Crimea and the Sea of Azov. The translation is this paper’s, and the figure is the ministry’s claim, not independently verified. By this paper’s count, it is the most the ministry has claimed on any of the past five nights, about four times the 155 it claimed the night before.Five NightsThe ministry’s overnight claims: 411 drones into Nov. 7, 142 into Nov. 8, 430 into Nov. 9, 155 into Nov. 10 and 627 into Nov. 11.

The drones flew between the first and second days of U.S.-brokered talks in Abu Dhabi, the first meeting of the two delegations in nine months, mediated by Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff; the AP said the talks were due to conclude later Wednesday. President Volodymyr Zelensky called Tuesday’s session “constructive and quite substantive.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio called it “very productive,” while cautioning, in the AP’s account, that a breakthrough would take time.

For Moscow, the cost of such nights is counted at the docks. Drones set the port alight in March, too; Bloomberg reported then, citing two people familiar with the situation, that authorities paused oil loading, and Ukraine’s General Staff said drones had hit Novatek’s oil-product facilities there, setting storage tanks and loading equipment ablaze.Ust-LugaThe Baltic port also holds a crude terminal operated by Transneft. It shipped some 450,000 barrels of crude a day in February, Bloomberg reported in March. What to watch is word from the port or Transneft on loadings, and any claim from Ukraine’s General Staff on what it hit.

The war ran the other way, too. Russia sent 163 attack drones of several types at Ukraine overnight, 91 of them jet-powered, and one Kh-59/69 guided missile, Ukraine’s Air Force said. By 8 a.m. Kyiv time it counted 130 of the drones shot down or suppressed, 72 of them jets, plus 14 Banderol/Dan-T drones; several were still in the air. It recorded hits at 17 locations and did not say what became of the missile.

By this paper’s arithmetic, the jets stopped were 79 percent of those sent, against 73 percent into Tuesday and 77 percent into Monday, as this paper reported; each figure comes from the Air Force’s preliminary morning count, taken at 8 a.m. Kyiv time except Tuesday’s, at 7:30. Nineteen jets had not been reported stopped by 8 a.m., against 26 at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday. Jets were 56 percent of the reported drone total, against more than two-thirds into Sunday, when Dnipro went dark.

Russia struck the Zaporizhzhia region and the city of Kharkiv, wounding seven civilians, the AP reported. In the Odesa region, the power company DTEK said strikes on energy facilities on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, its substations among them, had left more than 135,000 families without power.

Sources

  1. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, on Telegram (in Russian), “Claims 627 Ukrainian drones destroyed overnight (post 68924),” Nov. 11, 2026.
  2. The Associated Press, via ClickOnDetroit, “Russia and Ukraine hold a second day of US-brokered talks in Abu Dhabi,” Nov. 11, 2026.
  3. ua.news, “In Russia, drones launched massive attacks on dozens of regions, and a fire broke out at the port of Ust-Luga,” Nov. 11, 2026.
  4. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, on Telegram (in Russian), “Claims 155 Ukrainian drones destroyed overnight (post 68898),” Nov. 10, 2026.
  5. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, on Telegram (in Russian), “Claims 430 Ukrainian drones destroyed overnight (post 68876),” Nov. 9, 2026.
  6. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, on Telegram (in Russian), “Claims 142 Ukrainian drones destroyed overnight (post 68839),” Nov. 8, 2026.
  7. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, on Telegram (in Russian), “Claims 411 Ukrainian drones destroyed overnight (post 68815),” Nov. 7, 2026.
  8. Bloomberg, via gCaptain, “Russian Baltic Port Halts Crude Loading as Drones Cause Fire,” March 25, 2026.
  9. Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, on Telegram (in Ukrainian), “Night into Nov. 11: a Kh-59/69 missile and 163 drones, 91 jets; 130 downed or suppressed, 72 of them jets, and 14 Banderol/Dan-T; hits at 17 locations (post 95044),” Nov. 11, 2026.
  10. Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, on Telegram (in Ukrainian), “Night into Nov. 10: an Iskander-M missile and 162 drones, 96 jets; 135 downed or suppressed, 70 of them jets (post 94783),” Nov. 10, 2026.
  11. Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, on Telegram (in Ukrainian), “Night into Nov. 9: 317 drones, 105 jets; 271 downed or suppressed, 81 of them jets (post 94425),” Nov. 9, 2026.
  12. Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, on Telegram (in Ukrainian), “Night into Nov. 8: three Kh-59/69 missiles and 164 drones, 112 jets (post 94139),” Nov. 8, 2026.
  13. DTEK, on Telegram (in Ukrainian), “Odesa region: more than 135,000 families without power after strikes on substations (post 4826),” Nov. 11, 2026.