Russian missile strikes on Kyiv in the night to Tuesday killed at least one person and injured 14 others, nine of whom had to be taken to hospital. Mayor Vitali Klitschko announced this on Tuesday, 27 October. “Most of the injured are students from the dormitory of one of the universities,” Klitschko said, according to BBC News Ukraine. People could still be lying under the rubble, President Volodymyr Zelensky said the evening before.
According to the authorities, the attack hit civilian targets in several districts of the city: a dormitory and a building complex of the State University of Trade and Economics (DTEU) in the Desnianskyi district, a clinic in the Dniprovskyi district where the blast wave destroyed the windows of the intensive care unit, and the metro stations “Lisova”, “Darnytsia” and “Chernihivska”. An ambulance crew was also fired upon on its way to an emergency call. The Southern Bridge over the Dnipro was so badly damaged that traffic for cars and trains in both directions has been temporarily suspended.
Two waves, 16 ballistic missiles
According to the Air Force Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the attack began on the evening of 26 October at around 18:00 and ran in two waves. The first wave hit the left-bank districts in the evening, the second after 3 a.m. hit the Southern Bridge and an administrative building in the Podilskyi district. According to the Air Force, Russia deployed 16 Iskander-M/S-400 ballistic missiles from the Bryansk region as well as 280 combat drones of the Shahed, “Gerbera” and decoy types. By 9 a.m., two missiles and 255 drones had been shot down or suppressed, it was said. Impacts were registered at 25 locations, debris fell at 16 other sites. At that time, according to the Air Force, several drones were still in Ukrainian airspace.
Zelensky spoke of a “serious escalation in the Russian operation against our logistics”. Russian ballistic missiles had hit “very busy places”, “and there is not a single military facility there”, he said. According to him, the Kyiv, Vinnytsia, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Odesa, Chernihiv, Sumy, Donetsk, Kherson and Chernivtsi regions were also attacked during the night, with targets almost everywhere being energy facilities, logistics and urban infrastructure.
What the Southern Bridge means
The Southern Bridge is one of the seven bridges over the Dnipro that connect the eastern and western parts of the city of three million for metro, rail and road traffic. It has already been the target of Russian attacks several times. Klitschko published photos showing destroyed crash barriers and damaged metro tracks. Experts are assessing the extent of the damage. The metro tunnel between the “Darnytsia” and “Chernihivska” stations as well as the exits of the “Lisova” station are damaged; on the green line, traffic between “Osokorky” and “Chervonyi Khutir” is suspended. Metro staff worked all night to maintain operations on the red line, it was said. Additional bus routes were set up for passengers. There were emergency power cuts in the city.
In the Chernihiv region, the head of the regional administration, Viacheslav Chaus, reported attacks on the village of Kholmy in the Kholmy community, where residential buildings and farm buildings caught fire and two people were injured, as well as on the border town of Semenivka, where a cultural centre and a residential building caught fire and two people were also injured. In the morning, a drone hit a residential building in a village of the Mena community. In the Novobavarskyi district of Kharkiv, according to the State Emergency Service DSNS, salvo rockets struck; two fires broke out, damaging garages, private and multi-storey residential buildings, a kindergarten, vehicles and buildings of private companies.
Zelensky again criticised delays in the delivery of anti-aircraft missiles. Ukraine has an acute shortage of interceptor missiles for Patriot systems, which are the only ones capable of shooting down ballistic missiles. He said he had repeatedly urged the USA to deliver Patriot missiles that had already been promised and paid for.
Editorial assessment: The attack shows how vulnerable Kyiv’s transport and supply arteries are – the Southern Bridge has been hit repeatedly, and the metro had to restrict operations on several lines. For the people in the city, this means longer journeys to work and school; for the authorities, another construction site alongside the repair of residential buildings and clinics. Whether the promised Patriot deliveries will arrive faster is open; the sources give no date for this.
Earlier coverage: Kyiv: South Bridge closed after Russian missile strike
