Still from drone footage of the damaged Nova Kakhovka Dam in the Russia-controlled parts of the Kherson region in southern Ukraine. (Twitter)

The Kakhovka dam in southern Ukraine was blown on Tuesday, unleashing a flood of water across the war zone, according to both Ukrainian and Russian forces who both blamed each other for destroying the dam.

Reports warn against 'critical water levels' that could threaten 80 settlements, TASS reported, citing emergency services. The news outlet revealed that the damage to the dam will also lead to problems with water supplies to Crimea, citing the Moscow-installed mayor of Nova Kakhovka.

The dam was at “unprecedentedly” high levels before today, The Washington Post’s Evan Hill reports.

Prior to whatever happened overnight, the Kakhovka Reservoir had reached unprecedentedly high levels. This was likely due to Russian forces keeping too few gates open, the NYT reported, just months after letting the reservoir sink to historic lows: https://t.co/g9sGjPNTt9 pic.twitter.com/mKuGFakb3M
— Evan Hill (@evanhill) June 6, 2023

On that note, Ukraine’s National Security Council announced that Zelensky will hold an emergency meeting over the dam blast.

Circulating videos on social media showed a series of intense explosions around the Kakhovka dam, and other videos showed water surging through the remains of the dam with bystanders expressing their shock.

The dam, 30 meters (yards) tall and 3.2 km (2 miles) long, was built in 1956 on the Dnipro River as part of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant. It holds an 18 km3 reservoir which also supplies water to the Crimean peninsula and to the Zaporozhye nuclear plant.

#BREAKING: The moment that the Nova Kakhovka dam was blown up was purportedly captured on video. If this footage is real, it would certainly refute claims that there was no explosion. pic.twitter.com/GMaarExZEn
— Ukraine Front Lines (@EuromaidanPR) June 6, 2023

"The Kakhovka (dam) was blown up by the Russian occupying forces," the South command of Ukraine's Armed Forces said on Tuesday on its Facebook page, adding, "The scale of the destruction, the speed and volumes of water, and the likely areas of inundation are being clarified."

Russian news agencies said the dam, controlled by Russian forces, had been destroyed in shelling and a Russian official said it was a terrorist attack.

Russians blew up Kakhovska hydroelectric power plant.
President Zelenskyy will hold an emergency meeting of the National Security Council of Ukraine due to the explosion of the dam of Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant
Kakhovka HPP is the sixth (lower and last) stage of the… pic.twitter.com/klKQD5CeAp
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) June 6, 2023

The Nova Kakhovka dam on Dnipro in Kyiv is no more.
This is now confirmed on Ukrainian news. Ukraine states that the dam was blown up by Russians. Russians deny the dam is blown.
If true, people will die and it is a war crime 1/
pic.twitter.com/xOm3sRbJjF
— Tymofiy Mylovanov (@Mylovanov) June 6, 2023

Ukrainian armed forces were considering flooding the Dneiper River by destroying the Nova Kakhovka dam back in October, confirming the Russian reports that came out about the matter last year, the Washington Post reported in late December.

The discussions about flooding the Dneiper came as Ukraine was launching an offensive against Russia in Kherson, with Kiev knowing that Russia was heavily reliant on the Antonovsky Bridge, the Antonovsky railway bridge, and the Nova Kakhovka dam, which is part of a hydroelectric facility that has a road on top of it, to supply its soldiers with arms, equipment, food, and other necessary goods.

"There were moments when we turned off their supply lines completely, and they still managed to build crossings," said Major General Andriy Kovalchuk, tasked with leading the Kherson offensive. "They managed to replenish ammunition. … It was very difficult."

The two bridges, the Antonovsky Bridge and the Antonovsky railway bridge were shelled with the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, more commonly known as HIMARS, which the United States had given Kiev.

According to the Washington Post, the Major General had mulled flooding the river at one point, putting under water dozens of civilian settlements and risking the lives of thousands. Kovalchuk said the Ukrainian fighters conducted a test strike with a HIMARS launcher on one of the floodgates at the Nova Kakhova dam, which saw them making three holes in the metal to see if this would lead the key river's water from getting raised enough to prevent - or hinder - the Russians from using the crossings.