Amid rolling blackouts, war-ravaged Ukraine braces for horrific winter
KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainians could face rolling blackouts from now through March amid frigid, snowy weather because Russian airstrikes have caused “colossal” damage to Ukraine’s power grid, officials said. To cope, authorities are urging people to stock up on supplies and evacuate hard-hit areas.
Sergey Kovalenko, the CEO of private energy provider DTEK Yasno, said the company is under instructions from Ukraine’s state grid operator to resume emergency blackouts in the areas it covers, including the capital Kyiv and the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region.
“Although there are fewer blackouts now, I want everyone to understand: Most likely, Ukrainians will have to live with blackouts until at least the end of March,” Mr. Kovalenko warned on Facebook. “Think about what will help you wait out a long shutdown.”
Russia has launched six massive aerial attacks against Ukraine’s power grid and other infrastructure since Oct. 10, as the war approaches its nine-month milestone. That targeted onslaught has caused widespread blackouts and deprived millions of Ukrainians of electricity, heat and water.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Russian missile strikes have damaged more than half of the country’s energy facilities.
Temperatures commonly stay below freezing in Ukraine in the winter, and snow has already fallen in many areas, including Kyiv. Ukrainian authorities have started evacuating civilians from recently liberated sections of the southern Kherson and Mykolaiv regions out of fear that the winter will be too hard to survive.
Heeding the call, women and children carried their limited belongings, along with dogs and cats, onto trains departing from the newly liberated city of Kherson.
The repeated Russian attacks — with the most severe on Nov. 15 involving 100 heavy rockets — have damaged practically every thermal and hydroelectric power plant in the country, and “the scale of destruction is colossal,” Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, the CEO of Ukrenergo, the state-owned power grid operator, said Tuesday.
The battle for terrain, while slowed due to the weather, has continued, with Ukrainian forces pressing a counteroffensive and Moscow’s troops keeping up artillery shelling and missile strikes.
In a key battlefield development, Natalia Humeniuk, of the Ukrainian army’s Operational Command South, said on Ukrainian television that Kyiv’s forces are attacking Russian positions on the Kinburn Spit, a gateway to the Black Sea basin, as well as parts of the southern Kherson region still under Russian control. In other developments: • Ukraine’s counter-intelligence service, police officers and the country’s National Guard on Tuesday searched one of the most famous Orthodox Christian sites in the capital, Kyiv, after a priest spoke favorably about Russia during a service.
• Ukraine’s presidential office said Tuesday at least eight civilians were killed and 16 were injured over the previous 24 hours, as Moscow’s forces again used drones, rockets and heavy artillery to pound eight Ukrainian regions.
• U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced the disbursement of $4.5 billion in funds to help “Ukraine defend against Russia’s illegal war by bolstering economic stability and supporting core government services.” The package will help fund wages for hospital workers, government employees and teachers, as well as social assistance for the elderly and vulnerable.