What blew up the Crimean Bridge in 2022

Referring to materials from the investigation into the explosion of the Kerch Bridge in October 2022, the Russian publication claims that solid rocket fuel was used.

Kommersant edition tellsthat an improvised explosive device with a power equivalent to 10 tons of TNT was used. It was based on solid rocket fuel, hidden in reels of plastic film.

According to the investigation, at the beginning of August 2022, film on 22 pallets, weighing 22.7 tons, was sent from Odessa to the Bulgarian city of Ruse, from there to the Georgian Poti, and then to Yerevan. While the cargo was in the Yerevan Transalyan terminal, it was cleared through customs, after which some of the accompanying documents were replaced.

On October 4, the film was transported in a DAF vehicle across the Georgian-Russian border at the Verkhniy Lars checkpoint, and two days later it was delivered to the wholesale base in Armavir, Krasnodar Territory. The pallets were loaded into an International ProStar with a trailer, the driver of which, Russian citizen Mahir Yusubov, did not know about the plans. He was supposed to deliver the film from Ulyanovsk LLC TEK-34 to LLC Extra, registered in Simferopol. The case materials note that such complex movements were necessary to weaken the attention of security forces to the cargo.

Russian experts believe that a foreign-made explosive based on hexogen was used to detonate the explosive mixture. The detonator, hidden under the film, was triggered by a signal from the GPS navigator “at the moment of passing a predetermined route point.” This was the 156th kilometer of the Novorossiysk-Kerch highway section.

As a result of the explosion, two spans of the bridge connecting the 235th and 236th supports collapsed, and 17 tank cars of the freight train were damaged. The Russian Investigative Committee believes that the Ukrainian Security Service organized the explosion.