Smoke rises from a cooling tower fire at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant in Ukraine on August 11. (Source: AP)

The announcement was made by ZNPP Communications Director Evgenia Yashina on the evening of August 11.

TASS news agency quoted Ms. Yashina as saying that VSU attacked ZNPP with a suicide drone and caused a fire, but the fire did not affect the plant's operations.

“The cooling towers are necessary for cooling. The equipment is now out of service and the cooling towers are not involved in cooling,” she explained.

Earlier, the Russian-appointed Governor of Zaporozhye Oblast Evgeniy Balitsky announced that the ZNPP's cooling system caught fire due to a VSU attack.

According to him, all six units of the plant are in a state of shutdown, there is no risk of steam explosion, while radiation levels around the nuclear power plant and the city of Energodar remain normal.

Meanwhile, in a statement on social media site X, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that its experts at ZNPP heard an explosion and saw black smoke to the north of the plant.

“ZNPP has informed the team of a suspected drone attack on one of the cooling towers at the facility. No impact on nuclear safety has been reported,” the statement said.

Ukraine has not yet commented on the above information.