Ukraine's 413th Separate Raid Regiment of the Unmanned Systems Forces struck the Snizhne Machine-Building Plant in occupied Donetsk Oblast in September, working with other Defense Forces units, the regiment posted on 6 October, sharing a video of the strike. The General Staff reported the strike on the plant on 11 September, saying that the extent of the damage was being clarified.

The strike adds to Ukraine's campaign of long-range attacks on Russian military targets as Russia has begun its winter campaign of strikes against Ukraine's energy infrastructure. Hitting the suppliers of aircraft parts goes after Russia's ability to keep its attack jets and helicopters flying.

The regiment said the plant works for Russia's military industry, producing engine components for attack aircraft and combat helicopters.

A former Motor Sich plant in occupied Snizhne

The Snizhne plant was a separate division of Motor Sich, a Ukrainian aircraft-engine maker based in Zaporizhzhia, a city that remains under Ukrainian control. Snizhne has been under Russian occupation since 2014. The plant specializes in producing parts for gas-turbine engines, including compressor and turbine discs and blades, the General Staff said. It never built whole engines. In September 2014, months into the occupation, it was machining blanks from Motor Sich's Zaporizhzhia plant into turbine blades and was one of only two plants in the former Soviet Union making such blades for helicopters, a plant worker said.

Motor Sich said in December 2017 that it had lost control of the plant. Weeks later, Viacheslav Bohuslaiev, then Motor Sich's honorary president and a member of parliament, told RFE/RL's Donbas.Realii that Motor Sich still owned the plant and had handed its management to a foreign company, while keeping it under the company's "full control."

In February 2023, Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office served Bohuslaiev a notice of suspicion of aiding a terrorist organization, alleging that Motor Sich shipped blanks to the Snizhne plant and received finished engine parts through foreign-registered companies. The case went to court in October 2023, and Bohuslaiev, who denies the charges, has been in pretrial detention since October 2022 as the trial continues.

Snizhne, which Russia uses as a rear base, has been hit before. In May, Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces and the Security Service of Ukraine struck a Russian training center for drone pilots in the city, and in September, a strike on energy infrastructure cut power across Snizhne.

“Thanks to our beloved soldiers. We await you in our unbreakable city,” reads a handwritten note beside cans and other foodstuffs received to stave off hunger in Oleshky, a city occupied by Russia. “Thank you,” echoes another note next to a shipment of coffee, herbal teas, and chocolate bars. Photos of these messages and others showing various tokens of gratitude have reached the phone of Roman Chuhalov, 44, one of the Ukrainian servicemen who, by sending aid with drones, are trying to break the blockade in this town in the southern Kherson region, where about 2,000 people are holding out.

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