Crimea the bridge connecting Russia and its occupied Crimean peninsula in Ukraine has been the number one target of Ukrainian forces since the end of February. The bridge not only has a symbolic meaning as a project created by dictator Vladimir Putin, but also a military role: it supplies the Russian army units that occupied the Kherson region. The bridge was partially damaged by an explosion on the morning of 8 October and it is currently unclear how the bridge spans were blown up, nor, more importantly, who is behind this sabotage.
In May 2018, when the roadside of the Crimean bridge was officially opened, the first person to cross the bridge was not the Russian president. Vladimir Putin, but the cat Mostik. The brown cat appeared at the bridge construction site on the Taman Peninsula as early as 2015 and workers welcomed him, believing Mostik to be the bridge’s mascot. Mostyk soon became a local star, which the implementers of the Crimean bridge project tried to “humanize” for Ukraine the course of the occupation of Crimea. Wearing a small orange helmet and a reflective vest worthy of a cat, Mostik posed both on the bridge and elsewhere in the Crimea. According to an ancient Russian tradition, a cat must be the first to be able to enter a new house, so Mostik was also able to walk on the Crimean bridge just built before Putin. Since February of this year, when Russia invaded Ukraine, Mostyk’s activities on social networks are no longer documented and, as the events of the morning of October 8 have shown, his talismanic abilities have not protected the Crimean bridge.
