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A Turkish sailor from Zonguldak, Kadir Kamilcelebi, has died from wounds sustained when the Turkish-flagged tanker Sabahat Telli was struck during an airstrike on Russia's Taganrog port.
A strike targeted Russia's Taganrog port on July 10, 2026, as part of Ukrainian operations in the Sea of Azov.
The strike hit the Turkish-flagged tanker Sabahat Telli, operated by Gemiciler Denizcilik and owned by the İnebolu-based Telli family.
Kamilcelebi, a crew member from Zonguldak, was severely wounded in the strike.
He was taken into intensive care for treatment in Russia, but died despite doctors' efforts.
His death has been met with deep grief in his hometown of Zonguldak, and funeral arrangements are expected to be announced once his body has been repatriated to Türkiye.
The Taganrog strikes occurred amid a sustained Ukrainian campaign against Russian shipping and port infrastructure in the Sea of Azov and Black Sea.
Russian state procurement records separately show that Rosmorport, Russia's state port operator, has commissioned project documentation for dredging work at Taganrog's port, with more than 42 million rubles allocated for the design phase.
The stated purpose is to expand the port's capacity for larger vessels and clear debris from sunken objects obstructing shipping, following what Russian regional media described as three consecutive days of drone attacks on the port in early July that damaged several tankers and infrastructure.
Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces announced that its units struck or destroyed 1,895 targets over a 24-hour period, including 356 personnel, drone launch sites, electronic warfare equipment, vehicles, artillery systems, and 392 drones, and reported a cumulative total of 30,317 targets struck since July 1, including 6,383 personnel.
Separately, Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces also announced its operators struck four additional maritime targets, two tankers, one dry cargo vessel and one other craft, in the most recent 24-hour period, bringing the total to 176 vessels struck between July 6 and 19 as part of what Ukraine calls Operation MoLoChKa, including 106 tankers, 40 dry cargo ships, 14 tugboats, seven ferries and five gas tankers.
Ukraine's forces claimed the operation had reduced the throughput capacity of the Kerch ferry crossing by 75%, saying all four ferries previously used to transport equipment and cargo between the "Kavkaz" and "Crimea" ports, along with a separate vessel, the SKS-One, had been struck or taken out of full operation as of July 19.
Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) separately said it struck a fourth Russian "shadow fleet" tanker, the Avero, in the Black Sea, along with three oil depots in Russia's Stavropol region, describing the tanker as a Suezmax-class vessel used to transport Russian crude oil to China and India during the period of G7 and EU oil embargoes, and targeted for its role in circumventing international sanctions.
The SBU said its strikes on the Stavropol oil depots, located roughly 600 kilometers from the Ukrainian border, caused large fires, explosions and burning fuel storage tanks at all three sites.
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