Patients and staff unharmed after taking shelter; baby boy born during assault as strikes hit civilian areas.
A Russian missile and drone attack on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv overnight into Thursday killed two people and injured at least eight others, damaging a maternity hospital and residential buildings, according to Ukrainian officials.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported the casualties and said one of those killed was found in a parking lot near the maternity hospital in the city’s Podilskyi district, where drone debris set several cars on fire. Windows and part of the facade of the hospital were damaged from the first to the fifth floors, along with doors and a nearby clinical diagnostic centre. Windows in the laundry and boiler rooms were also shattered.
Russian Strikes Hit Kyiv, Maternity Hospital Shelters Patients:
Ukraine’s Ministry of Health said all patients, children and medical staff had taken shelter in time and suffered no injuries. Medical care continued without interruption inside the shelter. At the height of the attack, around 2:05am local time, a baby boy was born at the facility.
“Even on such a terrible night, life goes on. Our doctors remain close to patients under any circumstances and do everything possible to ensure that assistance is provided in a timely manner,” said Tetyana Mostepan, director of the Kyiv Department of Health.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was in New York attending the United Nations General Assembly, condemned the strikes. “As people were sleeping, flashes from explosions lit up the sky,” he wrote on Telegram. “Once again, the main targets of their strike were Kyiv and civilian infrastructure, residential buildings, a maternity hospital, energy infrastructure, and logistics.”
Ukraine’s Air Force said Russia launched an unspecified number of hypersonic and ballistic missiles, including Zircon missiles, along with 282 attack drones of various types overnight. Ukrainian forces intercepted a large number of the incoming weapons, with air defence systems shooting down more than 200 missiles and drones across the country.
In addition to the maternity hospital, the attacks damaged private homes, warehouses, a post office and dozens of cars across several districts of Kyiv, including Dniprovskyi, Podilskyi and Solomyanskyi. In the Dniprovskyi district, a private house was damaged and officials initially warned that people might be trapped under rubble. Emergency services responded across the capital.
Russian Strikes Kill at Least Eight in Ukraine:
A separate Russian strike on a vegetable storage facility at a farm in a village in the northeastern Kharkiv region killed six people and injured 12 others, according to local prosecutors, bringing the overall death toll from the night’s attacks across Ukraine to at least eight.
The assault comes amid intensified Russian aerial campaigns in recent months, with Moscow deploying larger numbers of drones and ballistic missiles that Ukrainian officials say are increasingly difficult to intercept due to shortages of advanced air defence systems. Zelenskyy has repeatedly called for additional ballistic missile interceptors to better protect civilian areas.
Russian forces have not issued a specific statement on the overnight strikes targeting Kyiv. Moscow routinely claims its attacks are aimed at military and energy infrastructure and denies deliberately targeting civilians, assertions rejected by Ukrainian authorities and many Western governments.
The latest attack underscores the ongoing vulnerability of Ukrainian cities more than four years into Russia’s full-scale invasion, even as diplomatic efforts continue at the United Nations and elsewhere to address the conflict. Emergency crews continued clearing debris and assessing damage in Kyiv on Thursday as residents began another day under the shadow of repeated aerial assaults.