Sea birds covered with oil were found on Monday dead and dying on Black Sea beaches dozens of kilometers from a tanker attacked and disabled by Ukrainian drones, contradicting official Russian statements the vessel was structurally intact and environmentally-threatening amounts of product had not leaked into local waters.Images published by the Anapa-based regional wildlife protection group Zhemchuzhnaya Reabilitatsionniy Tsenter (Zhemchuzhnaya Rehabilitation Center) on Sunday and Monday showed seagulls, grebes, pigeons and a white swans soiled with oil and needing treatment. Some of the birds had been found on local beaches unable to move, a worker said in an appeal for donations and volunteers to help with cleaning.
The local news platform Ostorozhno Novosti in a Sunday report showed rescue workers washing petroleum-based gunk from the feathers of seabirds and globs of congealed diesel oil washed up on the sea shore near the village Abrau-Dyurso, some 200+ km (124 miles) from the scene of the attack on a 100,000+ ton tanker off-shore the seaside resort city Sochi on Oct. 6.
Zhora Kavanosyan, a Sochi-based ecologist, in a Monday Telegram report said beach-walkers found some oil-covered birds near the villages of Lazarevsky, Sosnovka and the city of Gedzhelik, all seaside resorts in the heart of the the Black Sea’s “Russian Riveria” region.
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The damaging Ukrainian drone strike hit the Fiberia-flagged Aframax Rio 30 km (19 miles) off shore Sochi, setting the vessel ablaze and forcing the crew to abandon ship.
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Sochi- and Krasnodar-based officials in the wake of the attack closed beaches temporarily but re-opened them the next day after declaring the fires aboard the Aframax under control and pollution to local waters minimal. For almost 24 hours after the attack, the tanker burned fiercely in waters off Sochi and beachgoers recorded burning oil flowing out of storage tanks into the sea.
Initially adrift, the vessel by Tuesday had been surrounded by oil containment buoys at an anchorage “beyond greater Sochi”, and “no evidence of oil slicks was visible”, a Transportation Ministry comment to Kavanosyan said. A report by the Russia-watch group Supernova+ said that the ship had been towed to the vicinity of the port Novorossiysk and work to empty the tanker’s bunkers had begun.
Geo-located social media video from Novorossiysk showed the ship completely blackened by fire, listing heavily to starboard and with forward decks nearly awash. Video recorded by local yachtsmen showed a charred Afromax anchored 2-3 miles (3.2 to 4.8 km) off shore the Novorossiysk resort village of Kabardinka.
Ukraine has accused Russia of using the Aframax as a shadow tanker to evade international sanctions on Russian crude oil and fuel exports. Marine traffic tracking platforms showed the vessel’s transponder had been turned off for almost a month and put its last tracked location, inaccurately, well to the south, off shore Georgia.
Russia’s Greenpeace branch in a Friday statement said the Aframax Rio following damaging hits by Ukrainian drones had spilled oil and potentially lost some of its structural integrity, and that the abandoned vessel drifting northwards parallel to the shore posed a serious threat to local wildlife and wetlands.
“Russian authorities’ claims that this incident did not result in environmental pollution are false…It can be said that this is serious pollution that will impact the ecosystems of the Black Sea,” the Greenpeace statement said in part. “[T]he threat of a major spill remains until all the contents are pumped out of the takes. The current condition of the ship’s hull is unknown, so it’s impossible to assess the likelihood of a further spill.”
In December 2024 two Russian tankers, the Volgoneft-212 and the Volgoneft-239, sank in the Kerch Strait, spilling most of their cargo into the sea over the winter. Thousands of birds died as a result along with at least 700 dolphins, Greenpeace tracking of those sinkings reported.
Ukraine in mid-July 2026 launched a martime drone strike campaign targeting Russian tanker traffic in the Black and Azov Seas, with shadow tankers thought by Kyiv to be assisting Moscow in evading international sanctions top priority targets for drone operators.
According to claims by Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (USF), since then through September, Ukrainian aircraft had hit or disabled 300+ Russian shadow tankers, of which 134 were hit in the Sea of Azov and 166 in the Black Sea.
Among the most spectacular attacks was a pair of November sea drone strikes that disabled the tankers Kairos and Virat off Turkey’s Black Sea coast, and a December 2025 aerial drone that hit the suspected shadow tanker Quendil in the central Mediterranean.Thanks to high oil prices and pressing Kremlin need for overseas cash earnings, Russian export of crude and petroleum products from its Black Sea ports has continued at reduced volumes. According to open source ship movement tracking platforms, Russian tanker traffic westward into the Black Sea escapes are roughly 1/3 pre-full-scale-war levels.
Stefan Korshak is the Kyiv Post Senior Defense Correspondent. He is from Houston Texas, is a Yalie and since the mid-1990s has worked as correspondent/photographer for newswire, newspapers, television and radio. He has reported from five wars but most enjoys doing articles on wildlife and nature. You can read his weekly blog on the Russo-Ukraine War on Facebook, Substack and Medium. His new book on the 2022 Siege of Mariupol is available on Amazon UK and Amazon US.