A new video filmed last week, which appears to have been taken by Russian soldiers or pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine, gives viewers a glimpse of what it was like to be surrounded by an ammunition dump after a Ukrainian strike caused it to cook off.
The video, which was posted to YouTube on Monday, is titled “Krasnyi Luch 16.06.22” indicating it was taken on Thursday in Krasnyi Luch (known in Ukrainian as Khrustalnyi) a town currently controlled by the pro-Russian separatist Ukrainian area of Luhansk. A rough translation of the video’s description states, “Dot-U hit the ammunition depots!!! Thank God our guys are alive!!” It is not entirely clear what weapons caused the ammunition to cook off but Dot-U appears to refer to the Scarab B (Tochka-U) Ukrainian ballistic missile.
The first several minutes of the video show troops moving around an ammunition depot and beginning to shout and take cover as they hear explosions in the area. The troops in the video eventually climb into a transport vehicle and drive a short distance.
The troops eventually leave the vehicle and soon find themselves taking cover as more explosions land nearby. The troops can then be seen running to take cover next to a building. For the next several minutes after reaching the building, explosions and debris can be seen falling all around them. At around the 5:15 mark in the video, an explosion lands next to a house across a street from the troops and debris begins to fall all around them.
The next several minutes of the video appears to show the troops moving from one piece of cover to the next as the ammunition cook-offs spread throughout the depot.
The troops run inside another building to take cover. While hiding in this building, more explosions could be heard all around them. Beginning at around the 6:15 mark in the video, the explosions begin to give off a red hue that streams through an open doorway in the building.
In the video, one man positioned near the doorway can be seen shielding himself with a board.
At around the 8:20 mark in the video, the group of troops appears to run out of the building while ammunition cooks off all around them, showering them in sparks and flames.
The video cuts out during this chaotic dash through the ammunition dump. The next scene captured in the lengthy video shows the troops finding and opening up a crawl space in another building as the explosions can still be heard going off all around them. The troops appear to consider entering the crawl space before backing out and simply taking cover in an adjoining room filled with dust and debris.
The video cuts again and the troops can be seen hopping fences, running through alleyways and out in the open again as ammunition explodes all around them.
On Saturday, a Twitter account shared a video appearing to show the aftermath of the ammunition depot explosion in Khrustalnyi.
“#Ukraine: 2 days ago, at least 1 Ukrainian Tochka-U ballistic missile hit a large RU/Separatist ammunition storage depot in Krasnyi Luch, #Luhansk Oblast,” tweeted Ukraine Weapons Tracker. “It was filled with artillery shells intended for the LNR ‘2nd Army Corps’; which now faces shortages.”
The video showed demolished buildings and debris strewn all throughout the area.
