The strike that hit Russia's last untouched refinery
On July 6, Ukrainian long-range drones struck the Gazpromneft-ONPZ refinery in Omsk, western Siberia — Russia's largest oil refinery and, until that day, one of only two facilities among the country's top ten refineries that had never been hit in the war. The drones, upgraded FP-1 models built by Ukrainian defense firm Fire Point, reportedly flew roughly 2,700–3,000 kilometers to reach the target — one of the deepest strikes into Russian territory since the full-scale invasion began, landing just as NATO leaders gathered for a summit in Ankara. Satellite imagery analyzed by open-source monitors confirmed at least four impact points on the refinery's ELOU-AVT-11 primary processing unit, which alone accounts for roughly 40% of the plant's output and has a design capacity of 8.4 million tonnes of crude a year. Omsk's regional governor, Vitaly Khotsenko, confirmed the attack and said Russian air defenses intercepted most, but not all, of the incoming drones. Ukraine's General Staff described Omsk as "the last of the 11 largest gasoline producers in Russia" to be successfully targeted — a marker of how systematically the campaign has worked through Russia's refining capacity over the past year. The refinery, which processes upward of 22 million tonnes of oil annually and supplies roughly 10–12% of Russia's total refining output, halted operations following the strike.
A nationwide crisis, not a local one
The Omsk strike landed on top of an already severe, months-long fuel crisis. A CNN analysis found that almost all of Russia's 83 recognized regions are experiencing gasoline shortages or supply disruptions, with more than 50 regions officially reporting problems and unofficial reports of disruption nearly everywhere else; separate tracking by Novaya Gazeta Europe put the figure at 78 of 83 regions, or roughly 94%, with only a handful of regions unaffected. Independent estimates suggest the crisis has directly touched around 50 million people — about a third of Russia's population — through rationing, purchase limits, or outright shortages. Eight of Russia's ten largest refineries have now been affected by strikes, including all three plants that supply Moscow via pipeline (Yaroslavl, Ryazan, and Kstovo). One analysis estimated operating refineries are now producing roughly 85,000 tonnes of petrol a day against summer peak demand of around 110,000 tonnes — a structural shortfall of about 25,000 tonnes daily.
What rationing looks like on the ground
Most affected regions have capped purchases at 20–30 litres per vehicle, banned filling jerry cans, and, in some cases, introduced odd-even sales systems based on license plate numbers. In Russian-occupied Crimea, authorities declared a state of emergency and briefly banned fuel sales to ordinary drivers entirely. In the Siberian city of Irkutsk, officials have installed portable toilets near gas stations for motorists facing waits of up to 12 hours, and police have fined black-market resellers caught reselling rationed fuel at inflated prices. In some regions, priority lanes originally reserved for government vehicles have been extended to war veterans and their families, prompting resentment among ordinary drivers stuck waiting. To ease the shortfall, Russia has banned gasoline and aviation fuel exports, is weighing a diesel export ban as well, has begun importing gasoline from Belarus, Kazakhstan, and India, and has temporarily relaxed fuel-quality standards to allow lower-grade Euro-3 petrol to be sold under Euro-5 labeling.
Novosibirsk's work-from-home order
The Omsk strike's ripple effects reached neighboring regions almost immediately. On July 8, the Novosibirsk region — home to nearly three million people and one of Siberia's largest economic hubs — declared a state of heightened alert and issued a government decree recommending that all employers outside critical sectors "switch staff to remote working and reduce fuel consumption," while urging residents to limit private car use within and beyond the region's borders, with no set end date. Deputy Governor Konstantin Khalzov signed the order. Neighboring Tomsk region issued similar guidance, encouraging officials to hold meetings online and reconsider business travel, while Irkutsk's mayor separately appealed to local business leaders to consider remote work arrangements.
The strategic logic behind the campaign
Ukraine has framed its intensified refinery campaign explicitly as economic warfare aimed at Russia's ability to fund and fuel its military — President Volodymyr Zelensky said the Omsk strike showed "Siberia, too, is now within reach of Ukrainian precision strikes," and Ukrainian officials have separately authorized a broader 40-day military and intelligence campaign aimed at pressuring Moscow toward ending the war. The economic toll is becoming harder for the Kremlin to downplay: Russian gasoline production is estimated to be down roughly 25% compared with June 2025, oil output in June 2026 came in 28% below the five-year average, inflation has climbed to around 6% against a 4% central bank target, and the government has slashed its 2026 GDP growth forecast from 1.3% to 0.4%. Sberbank CEO German Gref told shareholders in late June that he doubted "there is anyone in this country whose primary concern is anything other than an end to military hostilities as soon as possible."
How the Kremlin is responding
President Vladimir Putin has publicly acknowledged the shortages while downplaying their severity, saying in a state media interview that "problems persist for both motorists and businesses" and that "there are still queues at petrol stations," but describing the situation as "not critical" and accusing Kyiv of trying to "create uncertainty for us, or even better to lead to a schism in Russian society." Not all analysts agree the crisis is existential for the Kremlin: some, including Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center's Sergey Vakulenko, have described the current shortage as smaller in scope than a more severe crisis in fall 2025, framing the situation as "a race between Ukrainian drones and Russian repair teams" whose outcome depends on whether Ukraine can sustain and intensify its strike tempo.
What to watch next
With Ukraine continuing to strike refineries, ports, and fuel depots across an increasingly wide geographic spread — including recent hits on facilities in Yaroslavl, Tver, and Stavropol Krai — and Russia's options for easing the shortage narrowing (subsidy reform is politically risky, ration cards carry symbolic weight, and import capacity is limited), the coming weeks are likely to show whether this becomes the crisis that meaningfully shifts Russian public sentiment on the war, or another disruption that Moscow manages to contain through rationing and imports, as it has so far.
This article reflects reporting as of July 13, 2026. This is an active, fast-developing situation — both the scale of the fuel crisis and Ukraine's strike campaign are changing quickly, so verify the latest regional rationing data and strike reports before publishing.