The US Department of Defense confirmed that the missile cruiser “Moskva” (“Moscow”) of the Russian Black Sea Fleet did not sink despite the accident that occurred yesterday on board.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed to CNN today, Thursday, that the lead ship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet is still afloat, despite suffering obvious damage from the accident.
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He said: “According to our assessments, the ship is still able to continue on its way, and this is what it is currently doing, and we believe that it is heading east, and it is likely that it will reach Sevastopol for repair work, but we do not know for sure why this accident happened.”
Kirby pointed out that the Russian cruiser at the time of the accident was about 96 km south of the Ukrainian port of Odessa with several other Russian ships, acknowledging that the Pentagon could not verify the allegations of Ukrainian officials who claimed that their country’s forces bombed “Moskva” with winged missiles.
He continued, “We are not sure what happened there, and according to our assessments, there was at least one explosion on board the cruiser, which was large and caused significant damage to the ship.”
Kirby pointed to indications that other Russian ships tried after the explosion to reach the “Moskva” help, but that “it did not seem necessary”, vowing that the United States would continue to follow the movements of the cruiser.
The Russian Defense Ministry had announced earlier today that the “Moskva” had not sunk and that the fire that broke out yesterday on board has been extinguished and caused some ammunition to explode in it.