Victory Chronicles-DAY 579

Russian forces attacked the port infrastructure in Odesa overnight, significantly damaging the Odesa marine terminal building and a hotel, destroying grain storage facilities, and damaging warehouse buildings. 

“The enemy insidiously hit the port infrastructure. The marine terminal in Odesa suffered significant damage, and a fire broke out in the terminal hotel building, which has not been functioning for several years. Firefighters promptly extinguished the fire” reported Defence Forces of Ukraine’s south.

The Defence Forces of Ukraine’s south also reported that the Russians destroyed grain storage facilities using Oniks missiles. Warehouse buildings belonging to a business and a private family home in the suburbs of Odesa were damaged as a result of falling wreckage. Grass in open areas also caught fire. The fires have been extinguished. Blast waves broke windows in several houses, wounding one civilian woman who received medical assistance.

Ukrenergo reported that 400 settlements remain without electricity due to the fighting and other reasons. Due to the hostilities, there are damages in the networks of regional power companies in Donetsk, Dnipro, Odesa, Sumy, Kharkiv, and Kherson Oblasts, reported the company’s press service. It is noted that the power supply is being restored under the security situation and with the military’s permission.

Igor Smelyansky, CEO of Ukrposhta, announced the release of a new stamp, Weapons of Victory. The World with Ukraine”. This is a charity stamp, the proceeds from which will be used to buy drones. The new stamps feature:

• Challenger 2 and Leopard 2 battle tanks;
• Patriot anti-aircraft missile system;
• CAESAR self-propelled artillery system;
• M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle.

“The names that are now familiar to everyone. Names that are voiced with fear and envy on propaganda channels, because everyone knows how this equipment performs in battle,” Ihor Smelyansky comments on the new stamps. According to Ukrposhta, the circulation of the stamps reaches 160,000. The price of each stamp is 25 hryvnias (approximately $0.7), 2 hryvnias of which is a charity value.

The Third Assault Brigade has published a video clip of the offensive actions of the soldiers of the 3rd Company of the 1st Assault Battalion as part of the operation to liberate Andriivka, Bakhmut district, Donetsk Oblast. 

After extensive formations and training, the soldiers of the 3rd Brigade managed to break through the enemy’s advanced defensive positions that were holding back the attack and began to move forward.

In the video, filmed by the assault aircraft’s GoPro cameras, you can see the soldiers of the brigade’s 1st assault battalion advancing through a forest belt scorched by the fighting. They are engaged in close combat and clearing out enemy dugouts and holes. After that, the stormtroopers enter the first streets of the village of Andriivka, which had been wiped out. Only mountains of concrete, brick and metal fragments remind us that there were buildings here.

The Third Assault Brigade liberated Andriivka on September 15, defeating the 72nd Separate Motorised Rifle Brigade (Russian Federation) and consolidating its positions.

ISW is providing an assessment of a very dynamic situation in the ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive near Orikhiv in western Zaporizhia Oblast. ISW emphasizes that the situation remains dynamic and unclear and that the tactical situation is likely changing rapidly. It is too early to forecast if Ukrainian forces will achieve an operational breakthrough in this sector of the front.

Elements of three Russian divisions are actively defending against Ukrainian assaults around the Ukrainian salient in the Orikhiv area in western Zaporizhia Oblast. Elements of the Russian 42nd Motorized Rifle Division (58th Combined Arms Army, Southern Military District) are deployed and are defending at the southernmost point of the Ukrainian penetration and are engaging Ukrainian forces in Novoprokopivka (13km south of Orikhiv).

Elements of the Russian 76th Air Assault Division deployed to the Ukrainian salient’s western flank near Kopani (11km southwest of Orikhiv) towards Robotyne (10m south of Orikhiv) and are counterattacking there. Elements of the 7th Air Assault Division are deployed on the Ukrainian salient‘s eastern flank near the Verbove-Novopokrovka line and are counterattacking there. Sources affiliated with the Russian Airborne (VDV) Forces report that the 56th Air Assault Regiment (7th Air Assault Division) is deployed about 5km north of Verbove near Novofedorivka.

A Russian source claimed that the 7th and 76th VDV Divisions were ordered to conduct an operational encirclement of the Ukrainian salient, but that they failed to do so and that the 7th VDV Division’s effectiveness significantly declined after a successful Ukrainian strike against the division headquarters on September 19. ISW offers no assessment about these reported orders to encircle Ukrainian forces beyond noting that it would be a sound practice for Russian forces to conduct counterattacks against Ukrainian forces’ flanks within limits.  

• Nighttime Russian attack on south: Ukrainian defenders shoot down 19 Shahed drones and 11 Kalibr missiles, but there are direct hits
• Ukrainian Defense Forces eliminated 420 more Russian soldiers and destroy 25 artillery systems over past 24 hours
• Russian airstrike on Beryslav in Kherson Oblast kills 2, injures 2
• The Guardian: Human rights lawyers and Ukrainian prosecutors are preparing a war crimes dossier to submit to the International Criminal Court (ICC), accusing Russia of intentionally causing starvation during the full-scale war in Ukraine
• BBC: British military bomb disposal teams training Ukrainian engineers to clear minefields.