Putin Abandoned His Residence In Sochi Out Of Fear

The Kremlin leader fears attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

Putin hadn't been seen for nearly a year at his Sochi residence, “Bocharov Ruchey”, which he used to visit dozens of times a year before the full-scale war began. In Sochi, the Russian president, among other things, traditionally celebrated his birthday and the birthday of Alina Kabaeva, whom the media refer to as the mother of his two sons.

According to the Financial Times citing data from the Kremlin’s website, Putin visited Sochi 24 times in the last year before the war. In 2024 and 2025, there were only two such trips each year. The Russian president’s last public visit to Sochi took place in October 2025.

Before the war began, Putin visited Sochi at least 20 times a year. The record was set in 2017, when he visited the city 37 times. The only notable exception was 2020, the year of the pandemic. Even after the full-scale invasion began, the habit persisted: in 2022, Putin visited “Bocharov Ruchey” 13 times, where he hosted the leaders of Turkey, Belarus, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Armenia.

The situation began to change in 2023, when Sochi and its surroundings came under attack from Ukrainian drones. In September and October of that year, drones struck Sochi Airport and nearby facilities. Putin visited the city one more time in October, but after that he virtually stopped coming to the residence.

Now, the region faces a threat not only from aerial drones but also from maritime drones. Ukrainian forces regularly attack Russian military targets in the Black Sea. In August, it was reported that the frigate “Admiral Makarov”—one of the key ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet—had been hit in Novorossiysk.

Another incident occurred on August 3: a Ukrainian drone crashed onto a beach near Gelendzhik. According to Russian authorities, seven people were killed and about 60 were injured as a result. Not far from Gelendzhik is a residence that the media link to Putin.

As the geographic scope of Ukrainian drone attacks expands, security measures around the Russian president are also being tightened. Putin is visiting regions in the European part of Russia—where drones can reach—less and less frequently, preferring to travel beyond the Urals.

Russian security services employ various measures to conceal the president’s routes and whereabouts. In particular, as The New York Times previously reported, the presidential motorcade in Moscow can be used as a diversionary tactic, and Putin himself is sometimes not even in it.

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