Original title: Burst! “Massive Air Raid”
According to Agence France-Presse and other media reports, local time1moon26On the 1st, air defense sirens sounded throughout Ukraine, and explosions were heard in Odessa, Nikolayev Oblast, Vinnytsia Oblast, Kyiv Oblast, and Dnepropetrovsk Oblast.
The Ukrainian military stated that the Russian army fired more than 30 missiles at various targets across Ukraine that day. In Kyiv, Ukrainian forces said they shot down a dozen missiles. “The enemy fired more than 15 cruise missiles in the direction of Kyiv, and thanks to our excellent air defense work, all air targets were shot down,” said Sergey Popko, head of Kyiv’s military administration.
The mayor of Kyiv, Vitaly Klitschko, said through social media: “An explosion in Kyiv! Stay in the shelter!” The power supply department also stated that Kyiv and several other regions of Ukraine implemented an emergency power outage on the 26th, ” To ease the pressure on the power grid after the Russian attack.”
Russia Today (RT) reported that on Thursday morning, Ukraine was hit by a wave of “huge-scale” Russian air strikes, and many energy facilities across Ukraine, including the capital Kyiv, were bombed.
Videos on social media showed thick smoke rising from a place in the city of Kyiv. The Kyiv Metro reportedly ceased operations during the airstrike. There were also explosions in the Black Sea port of Odessa, hitting at least two substations.
According to Reuters, before Russia launched this round of air strikes, the United States, Germany and other countries officially announced that they were ready to provide Ukraine with advanced main battle tanks to help it fight Russia. The Russian side condemned this practice as “extremely dangerous.”