Ukraine power grid hit by major Russian drone and missile attack

More than one million people in Ukraine have been left without power after Russia launched a “massive strike” on the country’s energy grid overnight.

The co-ordinated assault unfolded over several hours with waves of drones and missiles flying across the length and breadth of Ukraine – the second attack of its kind this month.

Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky said cluster munitions were used specifically against civilian and energy infrastructure.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia launched 90 missiles and 100 drones in response to Ukraine’s attacks with UK and US-supplied weapons last week.

“We carried out a comprehensive strike,” Putin said during a visit to Kazakhstan on Thursday.

“It was a response to continued attacks on our territory by (US) ATACMS missiles.”

President Putin said Russia is selecting targets in Ukraine that could include decision-making centres in Kyiv.

Last week, Ukraine used UK and US weapons to strike Russian territory for the first time since the full-scale invasion in February 2022.

In recent days it has prompted retaliatory strikes from Russia.

Explosions have been reported in several cities, including Odesa, Kharkiv, and Lutsk.

Kyiv was also the target of attacks, but Ukrainian authorities say all missiles targeting the capital were intercepted.

Kyiv’s military administration said the attack lasted almost nine-and-a-half hours.

At least 12 areas across Ukraine, including three western regions, have been hit and Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said emergency power outages had been introduced.

“Our energy system is the target,” Zelensky said on Telegram.

“These cluster munitions make it significantly more difficult for our rescuers and energy workers to liquidate the impact of the strikes,” he added, calling it a “very mean escalation” in the conflict.

Elsewhere, the mayor of Kharkiv, Igor Terekhov, said there was shelling of a civilian area in the city, while the mayor of Lutsk, Ihor Polishchuk, said multiple explosions had been heard and electricity was out in part of the city.

Mr Polishchuk said trolleybuses in Lutsk have stopped while the head of the Rivne administration Oleksandr Koval has said electricity supplies have been cut to over 280,000 people in the western region.

In the Lviv region, as many as 523,000 homes and businesses are without electricity, according to regional head Maksym Kozytsky.

Ukrainian authorities have responded by implementing pre-emptive emergency power cuts in order to minimise damaging overloads to the country’s grid.

Temperatures are dropping and the country has already experienced its first snowfalls, but the full force of Ukraine’s famously harsh winter has not yet been felt.

Ukrainian officials have been warning for some time that Russia has been stockpiling cruise and ballistic missiles in order to launch co-ordinated and country-wide attacks on Ukraine’s energy system.

If Russia keeps up these country-wide attacks on Ukraine’s energy system, as it has in previous winters, then the country will once again face a challenging few months.

Earlier this month, Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, said its thermal energy plants suffered “significant damage”, resulting in blackouts.

That attack was the eighth large-scale one targeting Ukraine’s energy facilities this year, DTEK said in a statement.

It added that its plants had been attacked more than 190 times since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian officials fear the most recent strike could signal another concerted Russian attempt to deplete the power grid as winter arrives.

Having already endured two-and-a-half bitter winters since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukrainians are bracing themselves for another.

Since Sunday evening, Russia has carried out close to 1,500 strikes on Ukraine following a week of escalation in the war which has also seen Ukraine fire US and British missiles into Russia for the first time.

Last Wednesday Ukraine launched UK-supplied Storm Shadow missiles at targets in Russia’s Kursk region.

In its response, Russia deployed a new type of missile – “Oreshnik” – to strike the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.

Additional reporting by Christy Cooney