Moscow targeted by drones after one person dies in latest wave of Kyiv air strikes
MOSCOW was hit by a wave of drone attacks today damaging several buildings, according to the city’s mayor.
Sergei Sobyanin said two people were injured, one of whom was hospitalised, and residents of two buildings damaged in the attack were evacuated.
It came as the Ukrainian capital Kyiv was targeted by a third wave of strikes in 24 hours. One person died and three were injured when a high-rise building caught fire as debris fell from drones taken out by air defence systems.
Residents in south-western Moscow said they heard loud bangs from around 3am UK time followed by the smell of petrol, in the rare apparent attack on Russia’s capital. Some filmed a drone being shot down and a plume of smoke rising over the skyline.
Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the wider Moscow region, said several drones were “shot down on the approach to Moscow”.
Russia’s defence ministry called it a “terrorist attack” by Ukraine. “Eight unmanned aerial vehicles were involved in the attack. All enemy drones were hit,” it said.
There was no immediate comment from Ukraine.
It came after the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence yesterday warned Vladimir Putin of a revenge attack following a daylight wave of missiles on Kyiv which caused explosions to ring out across the city.
The buzzing of drones and loud explosions were heard again over the capital in the early hours of today.
According to preliminary data, more than 20 Shahed drones were destroyed by air defence forces in Kyiv’s airspace, the city’s military administration said.
One person died and three were injured when a high-rise building in the Holosiiv district caught fire.
The two upper floors were destroyed, and there may be people under the rubble, the Kyiv military administration said. More than 20 people were evacuated.
Elsewhere in the capital, falling debris caused a fire in a private house in the Darnytskyi district and three cars were set alight in the Pechersky district, according to the military administration.
The intensifying aerial battle comes ahead of an expected counter-offensive by Ukraine against Putin’s forces in the east of the country.
One of Ukraine’s top security officials, Oleksiy Danilov, has told the BBC that it was ready to launch its assault to retake territory, saying it could begin “tomorrow, the day after tomorrow or in a week”.
Last night Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke about the “timing” of how the military would “move forward”, backed by large amounts of West-supplied weaponry. “The decisions have been made,” he added.