At least 17 civilians were killed and more than 90 injured in a massive Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv that lasted through the night into Thursday morning, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko. The assault, which Moscow described as retaliation for Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil facilities, sent residents into subway shelters as explosions rocked the capital for hours.
Attack Details and Casualties
Ukraine’s air force reported that Russia fired 74 missiles, including 24 ballistic missiles, and 496 drones in the attack. Emergency crews were still digging through rubble of collapsed and charred apartment buildings at dawn. Damage was recorded in 30 locations across the city, mainly residential buildings and civilian infrastructure, said Tymur Tkachenko, head of the Kyiv City Military Administration. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko stated that 20 residential buildings were damaged.
In the Desnianskyi district, people were trapped inside a damaged nine-story residential building, and rescuers were at the scene. In the Darnytskyi district, six levels of a nine-story building collapsed. In the Holosiivskyi district, a fire broke out on the roof of a 16-story building, according to the Emergency Service, which deployed nearly 500 personnel and 100 specialized vehicles.
Russia’s Justification and Ukraine’s Response
Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement that the bombardment used “high-precision long-range weapons” and drones targeting “military industry facilities and fuel and energy complexes in Kyiv and the Kyiv region, as well as military airfield infrastructure in four other regions of Ukraine.” It published a list of targets it said were hit, mostly plants manufacturing and assembling Ukrainian drones, missiles, and components.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha described it as a “night of horror” and urged countries not to delay decisions on supplying air defense systems and missiles. He rejected Russian attempts to justify the strikes as retaliation, stating that Ukraine was exercising its right to self-defense under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter while Russia remained the aggressor. Sybiha said on X that the death toll may rise as rescue teams continue their work.
Ukrainian Strikes on Russian Infrastructure
Ukrainian forces struck one of Russia’s largest oil refineries overnight in the Nizhny Novgorod region east of Moscow, starting a fire, according to Ukraine’s General Staff. They also struck a railway bridge over the Siverskyi Donets River in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region, used by Russian forces to transport personnel, weapons, and military supplies.
Ukraine’s recent success with drone strikes that keep Russian troops pinned down on the front line, disrupt supply lines, and damage oil facilities has brought a significant change in the war, Western analysts say. “Russia’s spring-summer 2026 offensive has failed to achieve operationally significant gains thus far, and Russian forces’ rate of advance in June 2026 (was) a fraction of the rate of advance that Russian forces achieved in June 2025,” the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said in an assessment late Wednesday.
Kyiv resident Serhii Budko, 24, told the Associated Press that three or four ballistic missiles hit his district: “We were inside the shelter and felt the shelter shaking — the ceiling and floor, everything.”
