Russian drones strike across Ukraine in heaviest air raid since invasion
PHOTO CAPTION: Illustrative file photo — Rescuers search for people under the debris at the site of an apartment building damaged during Russian missile and drone strikes, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine May 14, 2026. (REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko)
By Olena Harmash and Yurii Kovalenko (Reuters)
KYIV - Russia carried out its largest aerial attack over a two-day period since the start of its war in Ukraine, pounding the capital Kyiv and other cities with hundreds of drones, Ukrainian officials said on Thursday.
Russia had launched more than 1,560 drones since the start of Wednesday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said. At least 11 people have been killed in the strikes, officials said
He said Moscow had launched more than 670 attack drones and 56 missiles overnight, and air defence units shot down 41 of the missiles and 652 drones, the air force said.
"These are definitely not the actions of those who believe the war is coming to an end," Zelenskiy said.
"It's important that partners do not remain silent about this strike. And it is equally important to continue supporting the protection of our skies."
At least five people were killed in Kyiv, Zelenskiy said. Six people were killed in a rare daytime attack carried out across western Ukraine on Wednesday, officials said.
Russia began its full-scale invasion in February 2022. The war, which has killed hundreds of thousands and ravaged swathes of Ukraine, has continued despite a U.S.-backed peace push although Moscow's battlefield advances have stalled this year.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday he thought the war was coming to an end. There was no immediate comment from Moscow on Thursday's attacks.
Kyiv was the main target of the overnight strikes, Zelenskiy said, adding that there was damage across 20 locations in the city and also in the Kyiv region. About 40 people including two children were wounded, officials said.
Dozens of emergency workers were cutting through concrete at the site of a Russian drone strike on a nine-story residential building where an entire section had been destroyed.
Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said more than 10 people were still missing as rescuers cleared the debris.
"There were people there, children. What happened to them? You have to understand, an entire building collapsed," Alla Komisarova, 74, a pensioner, told Reuters on the site of the strike, holding back tears.
"I heard something flying, it's flying nearby...And then there was such a terrible sound, and our house, which is opposite (to the one hit) jumped and staggered."
DAMAGE ACROSS UKRAINE
Zelenskiy said that overall 180 facilities had been damaged in Ukraine, including more than 50 residential buildings.
He said a UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs vehicle had come under fire from drones during a humanitarian mission in the Ukrainian city of Kherson.
The Russian striikes disrupted water supplies in Kyiv, and authorities were turning on generators to restore flows to households, the city's mayor said.
Twenty-eight people including three children were wounded in Ukraine's second-largest city, Kharkiv, where civilian infrastructure was targeted, regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said.
Ukraine's energy ministry said electricity supplies in 11 regions had been disrupted, and the strikes also targeted port infrastructure in the southern Odesa region and railways, officials said.
Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the attack - while U.S. President Donald Trump is visiting China - showed Russia wanted to continue fighting despite Washington's peace push, and said pressure was needed on Moscow to end the war.
"I am certain that the leaders of the United States and China have enough leverage over Moscow to tell Putin to finally end the war," he wrote on X.
British defence minister John Healey, writing on social media, said he had directed officials to send air-defence aid to Ukraine "as fast as possible".
(Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk, Dan Peleschuk, Valentyn Ogirenko and Ron Popeski; Editing by Daniel Flynn, Toby Chopra and Timothy Heritage // REUTERS)
