The most probable cause of the destruction of the Kakhovka HPP is an internal detonation. Shelling from the outside could hardly have caused such consequences.
The New York Times interviewed engineering and munitions experts told about it.
They note that there is currently little evidence that only an internal explosion could have caused the dam to collapse. An explosion in a confined space, when all the energy is directed at the structures, according to experts, causes the most damage. But even this would require hundreds of kilograms of explosives.
Firing missiles from the outside would do little damage to the dam, but much more explosive would be needed to achieve the same effect.
Experts say that the destruction of dams due to a large mass of water is also possible, but in the case of the Kakhovka HPP, it is almost impossible. They say that for this reason dams usually collapse on a piece of land, on one of the banks. But the hydroelectric power plant broke through the center of the dam. According to them, the water may have damaged several sluice gates, but not to tear the dam apart.
- On the night of June 6, the dam of the Kakhovka HPP in the Kherson region was breached. Ukraine accused Russia of undermining the hydroelectric power station, and the occupying authorities of the Kherson region informed that the hydroelectric power station had been "fired". Due to the breach of the Kakhovka HPP dam, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is under threat, it is also possible to deprive people of drinking water in the south of the Kherson region and in the Crimea, and to destroy part of the population centers and the biosphere. According to Ukrainian intelligence, the Russians deliberately blew up the dam, but they did it chaotically, which caused their military equipment to sink.
- On the right bank of the Dnipro River, 16 000 people were in the critical flooding zone, evacuation was announced in the region. After the detonation of the hydroelectric power station, the zoo in Nova Kakhovka was flooded, almost all the animals died.
- Reconstruction of the Kakhovka HPP will cost up to one billion dollars and will last five years. The UN and the European Union will provide humanitarian assistance to victims of the destruction of the dam. The White House stated that it will not leave it and will help Ukraine.