1 crew member died and 27 are missing after Moskva warship sank, according to Russian state media

One crew member died and 27 are missing after Russia’s guided-missile cruiser, the Moskva, sank last week in the Black Sea, the Russian Ministry of Defense said Friday, according to Russian state media TASS.

It added that the remaining 396 crew members were evacuated from the Moskva cruiser to nearby Black Sea fleet ships and sent to Sevastopol, a city in Crimea. The state media outlet said that the crew member who died, Ivan Leonidovich Vakhrushev, saved “hundreds” of his fellow servicemen. 

The Russian government, as of Tuesday, had not previously acknowledged any casualties.

Ukraine and Russia have provided conflicting accounts of what happened that day.

Ukrainians said the Moskva sunk after being struck by Ukrainian missiles, but Russia denies the claim, insisting that the reason for the sinking was a fire. But the US on April 15 confirmed Ukraine’s account, with a senior defense official saying that the US believes that two Ukrainian Neptune missiles hit the Russian warship.

“And now we’ll have to look into the matter as to how long this ‘gone missing’ in the open sea can continue,” said Dmitry Shkrebets, the father of a conscript aboard the ship, in a post on the Russian social network Vkontakte in reaction to Friday’s announcement.

Earlier, Shkrebets posted to the network seeing information on the sailors missing after the ship sank, and claimed his son, Yegor Shkrebets, had been aboard the ship and served as a ship’s cook.   

Shkrebets said in his earlier post, “It was reported that the entire crew had been evacuated. It’s a lie! A blatant and cynical lie!”

The ship sank in the Black Sea on April 14, and CNN reported that it was the biggest wartime loss of a naval ship in 40 years.

The state media outlet quoted the Russian Defense Ministry, saying it is providing all necessary support and aid to the relatives and close ones of the dead and the missing in action.