Moscow airports reportedly restrict flights amid drone attack threat

All airports serving Moscow restricted their operations late on November 2 because of the threat of a drone attack, according to a social media account that monitors the war ¹. The post appeared around 21:14 UTC, shortly after midnight local time. As of publication, the restrictions had not been confirmed by Russian aviation authorities or by the airports.

A second account on X, @CombatVetVoice, said Moscow's mayor had reported that 493 drones flew toward the capital and that airports were shut ². That post did not link to or quote a statement from the mayor's office. The figure has not been independently verified. If accurate, it would be an unusually large number of drones aimed at the city in a single attack.

Other accounts circulating online said Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports were fully closed, while Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky continued operating with limits. These airport-by-airport details have not been confirmed.

Neither post reported casualties or damage in the Moscow area ¹². No information was available on how many flights were delayed, diverted or cancelled, or on how long the restrictions lasted.

Moscow-area airports have repeatedly faced temporary suspensions or limits on arrivals and departures during Ukrainian drone attacks over the past few years. Russian aviation authorities usually announce these measures through official channels. Early reports from monitoring accounts have sometimes overstated their scope, for example by describing an airport as closed when only some operations were restricted.

The reported restrictions came during a night of intense long-range strikes by both sides. Separate reports said Ukrainian forces attacked an oil refinery in Yaroslavl, northeast of Moscow, in the early hours of November 3. Ukraine reported a large Russian drone and missile attack on its energy infrastructure that same night, including strikes on power plants in several regions.

Russia's Defence Ministry, the Moscow mayor's office and Ukrainian officials had not commented on the reported Moscow disruptions in the posts cited here ¹². The scale of any drone attack on the capital, and how many drones may have been intercepted, remained unclear.