Attack Drones Cause Stir Near VIP Dacha Where Putin Could Be Vacationing

This happened over Lake Ladoga.

On the night of January 29, several Russian regions were attacked by Ukrainian drones. Russian air defense shot down one of the drones over Lake Ladoga in the Leningrad Region.

About 100 km from the place where the drone fell is the dacha of friends of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, where he himself could have been vacationing at the time of the attack. This is reported by the Russian publication “Agency”.

“During the night drone attack on the regions of Russia, air defense forces shot down one of the UAVs near the shore over Lake Ladoga in the Leningrad Region. On this lake, about 100 km from the area where the drone is supposed to have fallen, is the Karelian dacha of Putin's friends, where the president himself could have been vacationing,” the publication writes.

According to Governor of the Leningrad Region Alexander Drozdenko, the drone was shot down by Russian air defense in the Vsevolozhsky District of the Leningrad Region. He said that there were no casualties or damage, but did not specify the exact location of the drone crash.

At the same time, the Agency emphasizes that Maryalakhti Bay is located approximately 115-170 km (depending on the point on the shore) in a straight line from the shore of the lake in the Vsevolozhsky District.

“There is a plot of land there, which, as Dozhd wrote in 2016, was owned by the Prime company, controlled by Putin’s friends Yuri Kovalchok and his son Boris. Local residents call this territory “Putin’s dacha.” Dozhd’s source also said that the residence was built for the president’s visits. In 2022, The Guardian published details of the interiors of this complex with marble floors and a bidet for 10 thousand dollars. There, as the newspaper wrote, there is a private brewery, a tea room with a view of the lake, two swimming pools and a path to a waterfall, which used to be a tourist attraction, and then it was fenced off. And in 2024, a video from a drone flying over the residence was published by the Dossier Center: it shows piers for yachts, a trout farm, a farm with cows and piers for yachts,” the publication writes.

The Kremlin has traditionally denied that Putin has anything to do with these objects on Lake Ladoga. And the Agency noted that Ukrainian drones have already made adjustments to the dictator's leisure.

“Drone attacks have already changed the president's rest. Last year, as Proekt reported, Putin practically stopped flying to Sochi, where he used to spend a significant part of the spring and autumn. The journalists' source explained this by the head of state's fear for his life after drone attacks on objects in the city. By March 2024, even the official presidential residence, Bocharov Ruchey, was demolished in the city, writes the Agency.

On the morning of January 29, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced the “destruction” of 104 Ukrainian UAVs: 47 UAVs over Kursk, 27 over Bryansk, 11 over Smolensk, 7 over Tver, 4 over Belgorod, 3 over Nizhny Novgorod, 3 over Kaluga, and one each over Rostov and Leningrad regions.

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