Russia fires 289 drones and 76 missiles at Ukraine's power grid as Americans vote

Russia launched one of its largest air attacks of the autumn on Ukraine overnight into Tuesday. It targeted power stations and substations in at least nine regions, hours before polls opened in the US midterm elections. President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia fired 289 attack drones, 17 ballistic missiles and 59 cruise missiles, and that the energy system was the main target. Emergency power cuts followed in Kyiv, Kyiv region and Dnipropetrovsk region.

Russia's defence ministry said its forces had carried out a "massive strike" with precision-guided weapons and long-range drones on power plants that it said supplied electricity to Ukraine's arms industry and army. Zelensky said it was "highly significant" that the attack came on the day Americans were voting, and that Moscow believed "America will not notice this signal". Neither side's account of the damage could be independently verified.

What happened

Ukraine's air force said its air defences shot down 49 cruise missiles, three ballistic missiles and 257 drones. It recorded hits at 23 locations and falling debris at 14 more, according to Ukrainian outlets that carried the air force statement. By the air force's own count, most of the ballistic missiles got through, since Zelensky put the number launched at 17 and only three were downed.

The private power company DTEK said on Telegram that Russia had attacked three of its thermal power plants "with dozens of missiles and drones" during the night and morning. "The damage is extensive. The stations have halted electricity generation," it said, according to Interfax-Ukraine. Zelensky listed energy facilities hit in the Odesa, Cherkasy, Zhytomyr, Vinnytsia, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Chernivtsi, Chernihiv and Rivne regions.

Regional officials described widespread outages. Euromaidan Press, compiling regional reports, said about 130 settlements with more than 180,000 customers lost power in Zhytomyr region, and that most of Vinnytsia region was cut off. A substation of the national grid operator Ukrenergo was damaged in Rivne region, and Cherkasy region moved to emergency blackouts on Ukrenergo's orders.

In Kharkiv, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said a strike had heavily damaged a city hospital in the Nemyshlianskyi district. Regional authorities said 73 people were injured, and Zelensky said the cardiology ward was hit while patients were being treated. Euromaidan Press reported that 226 patients were being evacuated. It said investigators believed the hospital was hit by a FAB-250 glide bomb, not by one of the overnight missiles. In Dnipro, Mayor Borys Filatov said a thermal power plant, a hospital and a hospice were among the buildings damaged. Local officials there reported one person killed and 17 injured.

What Russia says

According to the state news agency TASS, Russia's defence ministry said it had hit the Ladyzhyn thermal power plant in Vinnytsia region and the Kryvyi Rih and Prydniprovska plants in Dnipropetrovsk region. It also said it struck the Kharkiv thermal power plant and two 330-kilovolt substations in Kharkiv region. The ministry said the plants "provided electricity to military-industrial enterprises and the Ukrainian army". It also said it had struck port infrastructure at Kiliya on the Danube, which it said the Ukrainian armed forces used, and two bulk carriers at the Black Sea port of Yuzhny that it said were carrying military and dual-use cargo. Moscow says it does not target civilians. The ministry statement reported by TASS did not mention the Kharkiv hospital.

Background

The attack came a day after Russian guided bombs struck a school used as an aid distribution point, and a shelter, in Komyshuvakha in the Zaporizhzhia region. The acting regional governor, Mykhailo Semikin, said on Tuesday that the death toll there had risen to 29, with five wounded and 48 people missing. The region has declared three days of mourning.

On Monday evening Zelensky said Ukrainian intelligence had warned that Russia was preparing a "massive attack" on energy and logistics, possibly timed for the US vote. He has repeatedly said Ukraine is short of interceptor missiles for its Patriot air defence systems.

Attacks on energy have been a feature of every winter of the war. Russia targets Ukraine's power plants and grid as temperatures fall, and Ukraine has hit Russian oil refineries, including the Kstovo refinery near Nizhny Novgorod over the weekend.

The strike also comes just before a new round of diplomacy. US envoy Steve Witkoff said on Monday that Washington would bring Russian and Ukrainian delegations together in Abu Dhabi, and the Kyiv Post reported the talks are set for 10 and 11 November. They will be the first US-mediated talks between the two sides since February, before the US and Israel went to war with Iran.

What they are saying

Zelensky wrote that the attack was "calculated primarily to target critical infrastructure". He urged the United States and other partners to help Ukraine strengthen its air defences, saying Russia would not stop its missile strikes unless Ukraine could protect its skies. He also said the US could help bring "a just and secure peace".

Latvia, which holds the rotating presidency of the UN Security Council this month, has called for an emergency meeting of the Council over Russia's recent strikes on civilians, Latvian Foreign Minister Baiba Braže said. No date for the meeting had been announced by Tuesday evening, India time.

Moscow has not publicly set out its terms for the Abu Dhabi round. Russia's position throughout the war has been that strikes on energy facilities target the Ukrainian military's capacity.

Why it matters for India

India has called throughout the war for dialogue and diplomacy, and remains a large buyer of Russian crude oil. A new winter campaign against Ukraine's grid, and Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, keep energy markets on edge at a time when the Strait of Hormuz crisis has already pushed oil prices above $100 a barrel. The Abu Dhabi talks are the first real test of whether the US can restart the negotiations it began earlier this year. Any deal that eases sanctions on Russian energy would affect the price and terms of the oil India buys.

What happens next

Ukrainian energy officials have not said how long repairs will take. DTEK said restoring the equipment "will take time", according to Euromaidan Press. Air raid alerts continued across much of the country on Tuesday. The UN Security Council meeting requested by Latvia, the Abu Dhabi talks on 10 and 11 November, and separate meetings on security guarantees in Brussels later that week are the next scheduled steps.

Key numbers

• 289 drones, 17 ballistic missiles and 59 cruise missiles launched, according to Zelensky
• 257 drones, 49 cruise missiles and 3 ballistic missiles shot down, according to Ukraine's air force
• 3 DTEK thermal power plants stopped generating, according to the company
• 73 injured in a strike on a Kharkiv hospital, according to regional authorities
• 29 killed, 48 missing in Komyshuvakha after Monday's strike, according to the regional governor