At least six people have been killed in Russia following what officials are calling one of the largest aerial assaults of the war, with hundreds of drones launched across multiple regions overnight into Sunday.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it destroyed 822 Ukrainian drones in the overnight assault, with roughly 600 detected heading toward Moscow, according to Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. About a third of those were reportedly shot down over the Moscow region itself.
Wildberries Warehouse Struck
A warehouse belonging to Wildberries, one of Russia’s largest online retailers, was hit during the attack. The facility, located in the town of Podolsk outside Moscow, caught fire, with images shared by Russian media showing thick columns of black smoke rising from the site.
Wildberries facilities have been targeted repeatedly since July, part of what Ukrainian officials describe as a campaign against logistics infrastructure allegedly used to facilitate the movement of military-related equipment. The attacks have destroyed billions of dollars’ worth of merchandise and increasingly brought the war home to the Russian public more than four and a half years into Moscow’s full-scale invasion.
Deaths Reported Across Multiple Regions
An 83-year-old man was killed after a drone struck a private home in the Moscow region, according to regional governor Andrey Vorobyov.
In Russia’s southwestern Rostov region, a drone attack involving more than 150 drones targeted three towns, killing five people, regional governor Yury Slyusar said. The strikes damaged several homes and a railway station and sparked a forest fire.
Ukraine Also Reports Deadly Russian Strikes
The escalation came as Russia continued its own intensified missile and drone campaign against Ukraine. A Russian missile strike on Kryvyi Rih killed two people and wounded 14 others, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said, while one more person was killed in the city of Sumy. A separate Russian attack on Kyiv sparked fires across the capital and injured six people, with a book market among the sites hit.
The two sides have steadily escalated their long-range strikes on one another, with Russia continuing to hit targets across Ukraine while Kyiv steps up drone operations deep inside Russian territory. Both Moscow and Kyiv continue to accuse each other of targeting civilian areas, while each maintains its strikes are aimed at military or strategic infrastructure.
BBC
