When a Russian drone strike set a high-rise across the street on fire just after midnight on May 4, 34-year-old veteran Petro Kryvoruka shook his wife, Halyna, awake in their Kyiv apartment.
As the buzzing of drones continued, he braced for another explosion. "I told (my wife), ‘Something is coming, it must be nearby,'" Kryvoruka told the Kyiv Independent the morning after the attack. "We decided to move to the corridor."
Moments later, more explosions rocked Kyiv’s Obolon district, in the northern part of the capital. The blast wave shattered the windows in the couple’s seventh-floor apartment in a nine-story building, covering the couch where Halyna, 36, had been sleeping just minutes earlier with glass.
"How do I feel now? I just hate them (the Russians). That's it," she told the Kyiv Independent.
According to local authorities, the drone strike affected three locations in the district, damaging around five high-rise buildings. It remains unclear whether the destruction was caused by direct drone hits or falling debris. The Sviatoshynskyi and Shevchenkivskyi districts of Kyiv were also hit in the attack.
Eleven people were injured in the overnight attack, the State Emergency Service reported in its latest update on May 4.
The head of the Kyiv City Military Administration, Tymur Tkachenko, said that two children, aged 14 and 17, were among the injured. Kyrylo Fesyk, the head of the Obolon District State Administration, later in the morning refuted those reports, saying there were no casualties in the area.
The attack comes as Moscow floats talks of a ceasefire while stepping up its attacks against Ukraine. In the past week alone, Russia has launched more than 1,180 attack drones, 1,360 guided bombs, and 10 missiles at Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on May 4.
The attack struck a quiet neighborhood of Obolon, an outer district of the city located nearest to Kyiv’s suburbs.
"There is absolutely nothing here, not even theoretically, that could be considered a military target. There aren't even any industrial facilities," Fesyk told the Kyiv Independent at the site of the attack as emergency response efforts were underway.
"There’s just a large, well-known mall, children's centers, and small businesses."
The Russian drone attack damaged one of the buildings of the Dream Town Mall, located between the Minska and Heroiv Dnipra metro stations. The shopping mall, made up of two huge buildings, each spanning 80,000 square meters, houses multiple clothing stores, restaurants, household goods stores, and various entertainment venues.
Despite the attack, it continued to operate the following morning, albeit partially.
A beauty salon and a supermarket next to the mall were also damaged, as well as a nearby kindergarten. Several burned-out cars surround the crater left by the drone strike. One of them belonged to Kryvoruka.
"It's a piece of iron. Thank God we are alive," his wife said.
"It's upsetting that these situations keep happening," Petro Kryvoruka continued, leaning on his cane. He returned from the front lines after being wounded two years ago.
"These bastards — there's really no other word for them — just don’t want to calm down, and it's the civilian population that suffers. While they sit there negotiating, playing tug-of-war, it's civilians who are paying the price," he said.
Earlier this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared a three-day ceasefire for Russia's Victory Day commemorations between May 7 and 9 — a move that Zelensky dismissed as a "theatrical performance," aimed at easing Russia’s international isolation and creating a favorable atmosphere for Moscow.
In early March, Kyiv agreed to a U.S.-backed strategy calling for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire. The Kremlin has so fas refused.
"A ceasefire means we have to make some kind of compromises," Kryvoruka said.
"How can we (Ukraine) agree to compromises? What are we even fighting for if we end up having to give something away? Our people won’t understand why we're dying, getting injured, and living the rest of our lives disabled."
Note from the author:
Hello there! This is Kateryna Denisova, the author of this piece. Russia’s attacks on Ukraine continue relentlessly, with no ceasefire in sight. This drone strike on Kyiv didn’t feel like any other to me — it hit dangerously close, just a few minutes walk from my home. My colleagues and I are working around the clock to keep you informed. Please consider supporting our reporting. This makes our work possible.
Olga Rudenko
