The explosion damaged some apartments in the city.
Moscow, Russia:
Russia said one of its fighter jets lost ammunition in Belgorod near the Ukrainian border on Thursday, with local officials reporting an explosion that injured two people and left a large crater in the city.
Russian jets have regularly flown over Belgorod since the start of Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine in February 2022.
On Thursday evening, local officials reported a large explosion in Belgorod, saying the blast left a crater in the city center and injured two women.
Belgorod region governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said the explosion sent out a shock wave that damaged four apartments and four cars and toppled power line poles.
“There was an explosion,” Gladkov said on the Telegram messaging app. He added that investigators and representatives of the Ministry of Emergencies are at the scene.
He said that as a result of the explosion, a “huge” crater about 20 meters wide (65 ft) had formed in the center of the city.
Gladkov and Belgorod Mayor Valentin Demidov posted photos of the damage on social media.
One photo showed grim-looking locals huddled outside an apartment building, with a woman holding a small dog and a fire engine nearby.
Other images showed the interior of the apartment damaged by the explosion.
Local officials did not say what caused the explosion, but the Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement saying a fighter plane had lost ammunition over Belgorod.
“During the flight of the Su-34 aircraft of the Aerospace Forces over the city of Belgorod, an unusual detonation of aviation ammunition occurred,” the ministry said.
The statement carried by Russian news agencies said that the incident happened at 22:15 local time.
Citing preliminary information, Gladkov said one woman was hospitalized with a head injury, while another woman was treated at the scene.
Demidov said residents of the damaged buildings would be temporarily moved to hotels.
The Belgorod region has been repeatedly shelled since Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
In January, Gladkov told Putin that 25 people had been killed and more than 90 wounded in the region since the start of the offensive.
In October 2022, a SU-34 jet crashed into a residential building in the southern city of Yeysk near the border with Ukraine, killing 16 people, including several children.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and was auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)