Ukrainian drones struck warehouses belonging to Wildberries — Russia's largest online shopping company — on 22 July 2026. The attacks hit the cities of Krasnodar and Nevinnomyssk in southern Russia, injuring eight people and forcing both facilities to evacuate, according to Wildberries CEO Tatiana Kim. Just four days earlier, a similar drone attack on Wildberries warehouses had killed eight workers on the night shift.

The 22 July operation hit several sites across southern Russia. In Nevinnomyssk, in the Stavropol region, governor Vladimir Vladimirov said a warehouse caught fire after a drone hit, and five people needed medical care. In Krasnodar, officials said three people were wounded by drone debris that fell on a Wildberries warehouse. People nearby described hearing 20 to 30 explosions. Another worker was killed in Armavir, also in the Krasnodar region, when drone debris struck a site there. Al Jazeera

Russia's military said its air defenses shot down 242 drones during the large-scale attack on the Krasnodar region, according to TASS, a Russian state news agency. TASS also reported one person killed and ten injured in that assault. UNN

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed the strikes. He said Ukrainian forces targeted "important facilities in the Krasnodar and Stavropol regions," including logistics centres — large warehouse hubs that move goods from one place to another — that supply the Russian army. Zelenskyy also said Ukrainian forces hit an oil tanker and four cargo ships belonging to what he called Russia's "shadow fleet," ships used to move oil or goods while avoiding Western sanctions. Al Jazeera

The sea attacks appear significant. Robert Brovdi, who leads Ukraine's drone forces, said Ukrainian drones struck 13 Russian vessels in the Black Sea and Sea of Azov over the 48 hours before 22 July. Hitting both land warehouses and ships at sea within a short window suggests Ukraine was trying to cut off Russian supply lines in several places at once.

These attacks follow an earlier strike on 18 July, when Ukrainian drones targeted Wildberries warehouses in Kotovsk, in the Tambov region, and Elektrostal, near Moscow. The Kotovsk strike killed seven people and injured 24, according to Tambov governor Yevgeny Pervyshov. Together, these strikes stretch from the Moscow area all the way south to the North Caucasus. Novaya Gazeta Europe TASS

Wildberries is Russia's biggest online retailer, and the repeated strikes on its warehouses raise important questions. The company runs a large network of warehouses that handle everyday consumer goods. But Zelenskyy says some of these sites also help supply the Russian military. If that is true, these warehouses could be considered legitimate military targets under international law. The problem is that civilian workers are present, which makes each strike harder to justify. The 18 July attack, which killed eight night-shift workers, shows the human cost of hitting buildings that serve both civilian and military purposes.

The fact that Ukraine struck the same company's warehouses twice in four days suggests its forces see Wildberries sites as important enough to attack again and again, rather than just hitting them once. The distance between the targeted cities — from Elektrostal near Moscow to Krasnodar and Stavropol in the south — means Ukraine either has a large fleet of long-range drones or is launching them from several different directions. Attacking ships at the same time also stretches Russia's air defenses across a very wide area.

What we do not yet know is how badly the warehouses themselves were damaged, or whether the strikes have actually disrupted Wildberries' operations or any military supplies that may pass through them. The company has evacuated at least two centres, and fires have been reported at several sites, but no detailed damage assessment has been made public.

The broader context here is that Ukraine has been using long-range drones more and more to hit targets deep inside Russia, including oil refineries and ammunition depots. The Wildberries campaign, if it continues, would expand that target list to include private companies and their supply chains, which carries serious risks of escalation and further civilian casualties.