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An overnight Russian attack left parts of southern Ukraine’s Odesa region without power early Saturday, the latest in a wave of strikes targeting the country’s energy infrastructure ahead of winter, local authorities said.
Regional governor Oleg Kiper said on Telegram that “the enemy attacked energy and civilian infrastructure in the Odesa region,” adding that repair crews were working “to fully restore power supply.”
Ukraine’s largest private energy firm, DTEK, reported blackouts in parts of the regional capital and said power had been restored to more than 240,000 households by Saturday morning.
Moscow has targeted Ukraine’s energy grid each winter since invading in 2022, cutting electricity and heating for millions in what Kyiv calls a deliberate war crime.
Russia denies targeting civilians and claims Ukraine uses energy sites to power its military sector.
The latest outages came a day after a massive Russian strike on Friday plunged much of Kyiv and nine other regions into darkness, marking one of the largest assaults on Ukraine’s power network in months.
DTEK said it had restored power to over 800,000 households in the capital following Friday’s attack.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned the strikes as a “record for villainy,” calling for tougher Western sanctions against Moscow.
Two employees of a regional energy company were killed and three others wounded when a Russian drone hit their vehicle in the northern Chernihiv region late Friday, regional governor Vyacheslav Chaus said. The drone also targeted a local fire brigade responding to the scene, he added.
Russia has not commented on the claims, and independent verification remains difficult due to ongoing hostilities.
Ukraine’s air force said the Russian attack involved 465 drones and 32 missiles, describing it as one of the most intense barrages of the war. It said air defenses shot down 405 drones and 15 missiles.
AFP correspondents in Kyiv reported multiple explosions overnight and widespread blackouts, with water and heating also disrupted in several districts.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the strikes targeted “critical infrastructure,” while the national police said 33 people were injured across Kyiv and other regions.
Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko called the assault “one of the largest concentrated strikes against energy facilities,” adding that it caused widespread outages “mainly in central and eastern regions.”
DTEK said it was the fourth major attack in a week on its facilities. Russian military blogger Alexander Kots claimed two power plants in Kyiv and six others nationwide were hit, though the report could not be independently verified.
In the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, a seven-year-old boy was killed, according to regional military head Ivan Fedorov.
Ukrainian residents described harrowing scenes following the overnight strikes.
“Around 3 a.m., we heard a terrible rumbling. All the windows in the apartment shattered,” said Yevgeniya Charchiyan, a Kyiv resident. “Thank God there was no fire; everyone is alive, but the apartment is uninhabitable.”
Another resident, Viktoria, said she was bracing for a harsh winter. “It’s impossible to get used to this,” she told Agence France-Presse (AFP), adding that she had stocked up on power banks and candles.
Cloudy weather and strong winds made it harder for Ukrainian air defenses to intercept drones, Zelenskyy said, noting that “weather conditions reduced our ability to shoot down projectiles by about 20–30 percent.”
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Diplomatic efforts to end the three-and-a-half-year war have stalled in recent months. At least 214 civilians were killed across Ukraine in September, the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission said Friday.
Russia said its latest strikes hit energy facilities that “supply power to Ukraine’s defense industry.”
A Ukrainian delegation led by Svyrydenko is expected to visit the United States next week to discuss energy resilience and air defense amid the escalating attacks.
The foreign ministry noted that Friday’s assault coincided with the third anniversary of Russia’s first major strike on Ukraine’s power grid, months after Moscow’s full-scale invasion began in 2022.
Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump said Washington and NATO allies were “stepping up the pressure” to end the war, though the Kremlin dismissed the comment, saying momentum toward a peace deal “has largely vanished.”
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