Russia strikes Kyiv with massive missile and drone attack, killing one

KYIV – Russia struck Ukraine’s capital Kyiv on May 24 with a massive wave of missiles and drones that damaged residential buildings and schools, killing at least one person, officials said.

Explosions reverberated through the city shortly after 1am local time (6am Singapore time), following a warning by Ukraine’s air force on its Telegram channel that Russia might launch a hypersonic Oreshnik ballistic missile.

The air force did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether an Oreshnik missile struck any target during the attack.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram that one person was killed after a nine-storey residential building in the capital’s central district of Shevchenko was hit. Emergency services were on site to extinguish the blaze.

He added that 21 people were injured, with 13 hospitalised and three in serious condition. Air raid sirens sounded again after sunrise on May 24 in Kyiv.

Many residents sought shelter overnight in the city’s metro stations. Ms Nataliia Zvarych, 62, said she rushed to her local station as explosions started rocking the city.

“It was terrifying, scary,” she added. “We have been sitting here for more than three hours now, listening to the explosions up there.”

In Shevchenko, several people were trapped inside an air raid shelter at a school after a strike blocked its entrance with debris, Mr Klitschko said.

The head of the city’s military administration said more people were believed to be stuck inside a shelter at a business centre in the same neighbourhood. He added that more than 40 locations in the city were damaged.

Strikes were reported in other parts of Ukraine. Three more people were injured in the broader Kyiv region, according to the governor, Mr Mykola Kalashnyk.

Sunrise reveals damage

As the sun rose, black smoke from several fires drifted across the city’s skyline, Reuters images showed. Fire workers used hoses to douse the flames in damaged buildings, and rescue workers evacuated the wounded.

The front facade of one five-storey residential building in Shevchenko had collapsed, images showed. Officials reported damage to offices, shops and the foyer of a metro station.

In the city’s historic Independence Square, a post office was damaged by an explosion.

On May 23, President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Russia was preparing a strike using the Oreshnik missile, citing intelligence from Ukraine, the US and Europe.

Russia has already attacked Ukraine twice with the Oreshnik, a missile President Vladimir Putin has boasted is impossible to intercept because of its reported velocity of more than 10 times the speed of sound.

Mr Zelensky’s warning came after Mr Putin ordered his military to prepare options for retaliation against Ukraine for a drone strike on a student dormitory in the Russian-controlled Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine on May 22.

Ukraine’s military denied the accusations and said it had targeted a Russian drone command unit.

Neighbouring Poland activated its military aviation amid the large-scale strikes on May 24 but no violations of its airspace were detected, its army said.

In a post on X, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the missile and drone attacks on civilian targets in Kyiv.

“We call on Russia to immediately cease these strikes and end this illegal war of aggression,” he said. REUTERS