Ukraine’s defense ministry issued a recall of 120mm artillery shells this week, citing defects in a recently delivered batch of rounds.
In a statement on Tuesday, the ministry said it was investigating incidents of “abnormal activation” of the shells from the last three weeks.
Officials didn’t say exactly how many rounds were affected, but Ukrainian media reported that 100,000 shells would be recalled.
The defective 120mm rounds — light artillery shells that Ukraine typically uses in mortars — were first reported in early November by Censor.Net, a local media outlet run by journalist Yuriy Butusov.
The outlet posted a video appearing to show a Ukrainian soldier complaining that the shells often failed to detonate and would sometimes fly only a short distance from their mortars.
Only about one in 10 rounds would fire and explode effectively, the soldier estimated.