Video footage appears to show a catastrophic explosion rip through a Ukrainian city, sending shockwaves through the air and a mushroom cloud into the sky.
There is currently no suggestion that the blast is nuclear but it is unclear exactly what type of explosion it was.
Social media users posting the clips said the explosion had been seen from the city of Kharkiv and are suggesting it could be a thermobaric bomb, also known as a vacuum bomb.
It was not immediately clear if anyone was hurt in the incident, which The Mirror reported hit the Chuguev airfield in the Kharkiv region.
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The distressing clips comes as Russia continued to bombard Ukraine’s largest cities on the sixth day of the invasion.
Meanwhile Russia’s nuclear submarines were sent out to do drills after President Vladimir Putin ordered his nation’s nuclear forces to be put on high alert.
Subs sailed off in the Barents Sea and mobile missile launchers roamed snow forests in Siberia.
Russia’s Northern Fleet said in a statement that several of its nuclear submarines were involved in exercises designed to ‘train manoeuvring in stormy conditions’.
It said several warships tasked with protecting northwest Russia’s Kola Peninsula, where several naval bases are located, would join the manoeuvres.
In the Irkutsk region of eastern Siberia, units of the Strategic Missile Forces dispersed Yars intercontinental ballistic missile launchers in forests to practice secret deployment, the defense ministry said in a statement.
The military did not say whether the drills were linked to Mr Putin’s order on Sunday and it is also unclear whether the exercises represented a change in the country’s normal nuclear training activities or posture.
The US said Putin’s move unnecessarily escalated an already dangerous conflict, but so far has announced no changes in its nuclear weapons alert level.
Putin’s order heightened already souring tensions, drawing comparisons to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis that saw Moscow and Washington teetering on the brink of a nuclear conflict.
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