Politics1 min read

Death toll hits 29 after Russian strike on Ukrainian aid site, with 48 still missing

By · Via NPR · Published by Everything Blog

In short

Moscow launched 289 attack drones, 17 ballistic missiles, and 59 cruise missiles overnight, hitting key facilities in Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, and Dnipro. The assault on the Komyushuvakha site utilized heavy bunker-busting munitions packed with nearly 1.5 tons of explosives, killing multiple first responders and injuring at least five people. Elsewhere, damaged healthcare centers in the Kharkiv region forced the evacuation and transfer of more than 200 patients. Across the border, Russian officials claimed to intercept hundreds of retaliatory Ukrainian drones targeting energy facilities and the capital.

Key points

  • Heavy bunker-busting munitions used in Zaporizhzhia inflicted catastrophic casualties amo…: Heavy bunker-busting munitions used in Zaporizhzhia inflicted catastrophic casualties among civilians and arriving emergency personnel.
  • Coordinated Russian strikes deliberately compromised Ukrainian civilian power networks an…: Coordinated Russian strikes deliberately compromised Ukrainian civilian power networks and prompted widespread evacuations of damaged medical centers.
  • Extensive Ukrainian drone counterattacks caused injuries, damaged an oil refinery in Yaro…: Extensive Ukrainian drone counterattacks caused injuries, damaged an oil refinery in Yaroslavl, and triggered rolling blackouts across occupied Crimea.

Sources checked by our analysis pipeline: 1

KYIV, Ukraine — The death toll from a Russian attack in southern Ukraine on a site where people had gathered to receive humanitarian aid rose to 29 on Tuesday, with 48 still missing, as a wave of overnight strikes targeted power plants across the country, damaged hospitals and wounded scores of people.

Dozens of rescuers and volunteers continued to search the cratered blast site of a destroyed aid facility and shelter in Komyushuvakha, a village in Ukraine's southern Zaporizhzhia region, hoping to find missing residents alive under the rubble. Instead, more bodies were pulled out and carried away in white plastic sheeting.

"The scale of the tragedy is terrifying," Mykhailo Semikin, acting head of the region's military administration, wrote in an online post. "This is one of the worst tragedies in terms of the number of civilian victims in our region since the start of the full-scale war."

Russia launched 289 attack drones, 17 ballistic missiles and 59 cruise missiles across nine regions, triggering emergency power cuts, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an online post that noted the barrage coincided…

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