Ukrainian drones struck the Dubna Space Communications Center in Moscow Oblast for the second time in eight days on Tuesday, June 30, targeting what President Volodymyr Zelensky described as the largest ground-based satellite communications complex in Russia.
The facility sits more than 310 miles from Ukraine’s border and houses satellite relays used by Russia’s Defense Ministry for command, reconnaissance, and troop coordination, Zelensky said on Telegram.
Ukrainian forces have now struck four such satellite centers across Moscow and Vladimir oblasts. “Step by step, we are implementing our plan of long-range sanctions and making it as difficult as possible for the aggressor state to carry out its invasion operations,” he wrote.
Today, our long-range sanctions against Russia for this war once again reached the Dubna space communications center in the Moscow region. This is a special satellite communications facility used, in particular, for reconnaissance and for coordinating the activity of Russia’s… pic.twitter.com/HMtNwSgOvv
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) June 30, 2026
Robert “Madyar” Brovdi, commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (USF), confirmed the unit’s involvement. “For the second time in a week, the USF Birds have crammed into a space communication station in Moscow. The subscriber is out of range,” Brovdi wrote on social media.
The second strike follows confirmed hardware damage from the June 22 attack. Ukraine’s General Staff said that operation damaged the hardware of the facility’s 32-meter MARK-IV antenna, a large parabolic dish used for satellite relay communications, along with an adjacent technical building. The strike also partially destroyed one wall of the main production and administrative complex.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defenses intercepted 419 Ukrainian drones across 18 regions and Russian-occupied Crimea overnight. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said 56 drones were shot down approaching the capital. Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports briefly suspended operations, Russia’s federal aviation agency Rosaviatsiya said.
A six-month-old baby died when a drone struck a home in Yegoryevsk, 60 miles southeast of Moscow, Governor Andrei Vorobyov said on Telegram. One child and two adults were hospitalized.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists that “civilians are suffering, children are dying.”
