Russia controls this area, but blames ukraine. kyiv is in no doubt. translation: the kakhovka hydroelectric power station. l it was an absolutely deliberate, prepared explosion. they knew exactly what they were doing. translation: tonight, | the kyiv regime comitted another terrorist crime. the kakhovka hydroelectric dam was blown up, which led to the flooding of significant territories. so what is the significance of the nova kakhovka dam? it supplies water to huge swathes of agricultural land, including in crimea. and the reservoir behind it provides water to cool the zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant further up river. both areas are under russian control. the reservoir is huge. the dnipro river is especially wide here 150 miles long, and up to 14 miles across. this is what the dam
Nuclear power plant the biggest one in europe. regardless of who or what caused the breach it has potentially deadly consequences for towns and villages in the path of the water. bbc verify has established there was already some damage to the dam even before today s developments. these images from areas downstream, show the scale of the flooding. within the past hour or so the operator has said the dam has been completely destroyed. these images are from the areas downstream showing the scale of the flooding already. the russian installed mayor of the town immediately next to the dam says, the water level there could rise by up to 12 metres. earlier, the ukrainian mp for odesa oleksiy goncharenko, spoke to us from the flooded area. this direction is the dam of khakovka hydroelectric station. this direction is the black sea, and here is the river.
From the newsagency at 630 this morning quoted the moscow imposed official saying that everything was peaceful and calm in the town. nothing going on at all. soon after that, another report quoted the same official saying actually, there had been a terrorist attack during the night, missile strikes on the dam, his story completely changed. they quoted a source in the security forces saying no, no missile strike. the dam had just collapsed. by lunchtime, people had seemed to agree on an official version of events here and we had it from president putin s spokesman, the defence minister, saying that as far as moscow was concerned, this was a terrorist attack from ukraine, a deliberate act of sabotage by the ukrainian side. russian officials
And the level is coming up because all these huge amounts of water which were stopped by the dam now is moving to to the sea. by the way, you smell there is a smell of an oil machine oil, engine oil, because more than 150 tonnes of engine oil is in the water. engine oilfrom the dam. and more maybe more will come because there is more than 300 tonnes more. so this is a huge ecological catastrophe. with that, the consequences will last for decades after what had happened. and that is, again, according to geneva convention, such attacks on hydroelectric stations, it equals the use of mass destruction weaponry.
In this trial. hello, welcome to verified live, three hours of breaking stories, and checking out the truth behind them. we start with that major development in ukraine where thousands of people have been told to evacuate their homes after kyiv accused russian forces of blowing up a major dam, threatening a catastrophic flood. this video tweeted by ukraine s president zelensky shows the breached kakhovka hydro electric dam. he has accused russia of blowing up the dam to slow its offensive by making it harder to cross the dnipro river. russia says ukraine is to blame. this dam is over the dnieper river, between areas controlled by russian and ukrainian armies in the south of ukraine and there are fears for the cooling capacity at the nearby zaporizhzhia