
The head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration, Alexander Prokudin on the morning of June 6, confirmed the undermining of the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station and said that the water would reach a critical level in five hours. Of the areas where flooding is going on, the evacuation of people began, he said.
According to one version, the dam was blew up, according to the other, previous damage was the cause of the breakthrough.
The operational command of the group of Ukrainian troops "South" on its Facebook page accused of undermining the Kakhovsky hydroelectric power station of the Russian military. Russian military bloggers, in turn, blame the Ukrainian army in the destruction of the hydroelectric power station.
The head of the Military-Civil Administration of the Kakhovsky district, Vladimir Leontyev, who was appointed by Russia, initially claimed that "everything is quiet and calm", but then said that the valves were destroyed as a result of the "night strikes", and now the uncontrolled water discharge is taking place downstream.
Update: Later, Leontiev said that the new Kakhovka was flooded. According to emergency services, 600 houses are flooded in the city.
TASS, citing a source, said that the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station was collapsed due to damage, one support collapsed, and the flooding of the territories is going on.
The version that the damage received previously received the cause of the dams was also expressed by journalists from Washington Post, Financial Times and the investigative project Conflict Intelligence Team. The arguments in favor of this version are damage to the road over the dam that have fallen in the photo in the last week.
The company "Ukrhydroenergo", which runs the Ukrainian hydroelectric power station, said that the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station was completely destroyed and was not subject to restoration.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine announced the evacuation of the civilian population from potential flooding zones on the right -bank part of the Dnieper. The department warned that under the threat of flooding of the village of Nikolaevka, Olgovka, Left, Tyaginka, Penal, Ivanovka, Tokarevka, Dnieper on the right bank of the Dnieper and part of Kherson - the island of shipbuilding.
President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky convened an emergency meeting of the country's national security Council in connection with the separation of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station. "Russian terrorists with the destruction of the dam of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station only confirm the whole world that they need to be expelled from each corner of the Ukrainian land," he said.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called the destruction of the hydroelectric power station an outrageous act that "once again demonstrates the cruelty of the Russian war in Ukraine." According to him, what happened exposes the life of thousands of civilians and causes significant damage to the environment, quoted by the Russian BBC service.
The head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andrei Ermak called the incident "eco -cide". The Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine began an investigation into the destruction of the dam.
In the Kremlin, the destruction of the Kakhovsky hydroelectric power station was called intentional sabotage, Russian news agencies report. Moscow rejects accusations of involvement in the undermining. The Russian Investigative Committee opened a criminal case of a terrorist attack.
Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station is located on the territory of the Kherson region of Ukraine partially controlled by Russia. On the shore of the Kakhovsky reservoir is the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant. Blotting the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station creates risks for ZAES because of possible problems with water cooling of reactors, and will also leave Crimea annexed by Russia without water.