Two Russian patrol ships of the Vasily Bykov project hit in the Black Sea

15 September, 2023 The Russian Project 22160 Vasily Bykov patrol ship in the camera of the Ukrainian naval drone. September 14, 2023. A frame from the United 24 video

In the southwestern part of the Black Sea, two Russian patrol ships were attacked. The Ukrainian Defense Forces said that they had damaged the Vasily Bykov Project 22160 ships. "On the morning of Thursday, September 14, the Defense Forces attacked two patrol ships.

There is some damage," the statement said. The details of the attack are unknown. Also on the morning of September 14, the invaders reported the destruction of "five unmanned boats" that, according to their version, tried to attack the patrol ship Sergei Kotov of the Russian Black Sea Fleet.

A series of Russian patrol ships of the Vasily Bykov project are equipped with short-range and long-range guided missile weaponry. After the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet had their board numbers painted over to make them harder to identify.

Currently, the Russian Black Sea Fleet consists of four Project 22160 corvettes, namely: Vasily Bykov, Dmitry Rogachev, Pavel Derzhavin, and Sergey Kotov. The Vasily Bykov ship is known to have participated in the attack on Zmiinyi Island on February 24, 2022, the first day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, along with the Russian missile cruiser Moskva. Following the final failure of the Black Sea Grain Initiative in mid-July 2023, Russia issued an ultimatum to all ships heading to Ukrainian Black Sea ports.

On August 13, 2023, the Russian patrol ship Vasily Bykov carried out a forced inspection of a Turkish civil cargo ship Sukru Okan sailing the Palauan flag, almost on the border of Turkey's territorial waters, northwest of the Bosphorus Strait.

Photo from open sources

Then a Russian helicopter landed on the deck of the Turkish cargo ship from a Ka-29 helicopter.

As previously reported, on September 13, the Russian Navy neutralized the Rostov-on-Don submarine in the occupied Crimea.