Russian drone escalation brings fear and chaos to Ukraine's railways
Russian drone attacks on Ukraine's railways have sharply intensified this year, forcing thousands of passenger evacuations and long delays. The rail operator says safety now takes priority over its once-renowned punctuality as winter approaches.
Ukraine's railways, which have kept the country connected since Russia's full-scale invasion began in 2022, are facing an intensifying wave of drone attacks this year. State-owned operator Ukrzaliznytsia says more than half of all locomotive strikes recorded since the invasion began have occurred in 2026 alone.
In September alone, 5,831 trains had to be evacuated because of drone threats — an average of 205 trains a day. Passengers describe being ordered off trains and told to run from carriages after a drone struck a locomotive near the Ukraine-Poland border, with one journey delayed six hours. A special train carrying former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson had passed through the same spot minutes earlier.
The attacks form part of a broader assault on infrastructure: two bridges in Kyiv have been struck in recent days, and passengers on a metro train were caught up in one attack. Of 521 locomotives hit since 2022, almost 60% were struck this year, while attacks on railway facilities overall rose from 1,206 last year to 1,700 so far this year.
Ukrzaliznytsia chief executive Oleksandr Pertsovskyi says Russia is combining the destructive power of Shahed drones with cameras, mesh networks and possibly AI-assisted image recognition to hit moving targets with greater precision. Ukraine responds partly through electronic measures to disrupt drone connectivity. In an underground command centre in Kyiv, staff track threats in real time, evacuating any passenger train within a 100km radius of a detected drone until it has moved away.
Eight company employees have been killed this year, six of them in a ballistic missile strike on a locomotive depot in Kyiv. With winter approaching and temperatures expected to fall to -20C, Ukrzaliznytsia and international donors are preparing winter evacuation kits, mobile shelters and bus services for areas facing frequent evacuations. Pertsovskyi says the railway will keep connecting the country regardless of the difficulties ahead.
