The Russians used a mixture of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and drones, Zelensky mentioned. Not like a 12 months in the past, Ukraine’s improved, Western-provided air-defense methods, which now embody the Patriot system, contained the harm, capturing down many of the 110 missiles, the president added. Final 12 months, tens of millions of Ukrainians skilled outages when Russia repeatedly pounded the ability grid.
About 18 bombers launched missiles, Ukraine’s Air Power mentioned. Navy head Gen. Valery Zaluzhny mentioned 87 missiles and 27 strike drones had been shot down out of 158 complete.
The assaults — meant to exhaust Ukraine’s beefed-up air protection, based on officers — hit websites throughout the nation, from Lviv in western Ukraine to Odessa within the south to the capital of Kyiv to Kharkiv and Dnipro within the east. Ukrainian Air Power spokesman Yuriy Ihnat advised Ukrainian media there had by no means been so many targets at one time.
“This time we noticed a considerable amount of rockets,” Ihnat mentioned. “The display screen was virtually purple — the screens. They had been spreading out over the entire of Ukraine. They flew with detours. Some rockets had been flying in circles and would then fly on to their goal.”
No less than 12 folks throughout the nation had been killed within the assaults, and greater than 75 had been injured. Affected buildings included a shopping center in central Dnipro in addition to a close-by maternity ward. A manufacturing facility in central Kyiv was focused, and Mayor Vitali Klitschko mentioned Friday morning that folks had been believed to nonetheless be trapped underneath the rubble. 13 condominium buildings and three colleges in Lviv had been broken, native authorities mentioned.
In Lviv area, a vital infrastructure facility was hit, the president’s workplace mentioned, declining to say which one. 4 areas skilled energy outages on account of the strikes.
“The individuals are shocked, such a misfortune throughout such a festive season,” mentioned Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi, including that some kids wouldn’t be capable of return to high school after the vacations.
Ihnat, the air pressure spokesman, mentioned that it was unclear what precisely the Russians had been focusing on, as some missiles had been intercepted by Ukrainian air protection, and harm was attributable to falling fragments.
“After they hit their targets, we all know for one hundred pc that this was their goal,” Ihnat mentioned. “When sure objects get hit, you may conclude that they had been making an attempt to goal for it. However there are additionally issues like particles. If a flying rocket is hit, it is a giant mass of steel, burning rocket gasoline and so forth. And the explosives may also nonetheless be undetonated. So when the particles of this rocket falls down, it could possibly nonetheless have critical penalties on the bottom. The work of air protection, even when it’s profitable, can nonetheless have critical penalties.”
Russia’s Ministry of Protection introduced Friday that it had carried out a “large strike with excessive precision weapons and unmanned aerial automobiles” towards Ukraine’s navy infrastructure, together with airfields, ammunition and gasoline storage websites. It said that every one focused services had been destroyed. The assertion couldn’t be independently verified.
Natalia Abbakumova in Riga, Latvia contributed to this report.