Two days after launching one of the boldest attacks since the start of Russia's invasion, targeting multiple air bases inside Russia, Ukraine announced on Tuesday, June 3, that it had struck the Kerch Bridge, which connects mainland Russia to Crimea, annexed by the Kremlin in 2014. According to Kyiv, the operation, carried out at dawn, required months of preparation and involved placing explosives beneath the structure. A short video released by the Ukrainian security service, the SBU, shows the aftermath of a powerful underwater explosion that caused a significant shock to the bridge's pillars. In its press release, the SBU stated that one thousand one hundred kilograms of TNT-equivalent explosives were used and that the bridge was in a state of emergency.

The full extent of the damage remains unclear. Traffic was halted for several hours on Tuesday before resuming late in the afternoon, according to a Russian Telegram channel that monitors the bridge traffic in real time. This was the third time since the beginning of the invasion that Ukraine has targeted the structure, which stands as a symbol of Russia's annexation of Crimea and was inaugurated in 2018 by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

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