Russian Missile Strike on Apartment Block in Pryluky Kills 14, Including Four Children

Russia's military launched a combined missile and drone attack on several regions of Ukraine overnight and into the morning. Ukraine's Air Force reported that since the previous evening, air defenses had shot down five ballistic missiles, 39 cruise missiles and 117 drones, 38 of them jet-powered.

Devastation in Pryluky

In the Chernihiv region city of Pryluky, a cruise missile destroyed two sections of a five-story apartment building. Authorities said 14 people died, including four children, while 50 people, seven of them children, were injured. Other residential buildings, a children's and youth creativity center, an industrial facility and private vehicles were also damaged.

Kyiv and Kremenchuk

In Kyiv, officials reported several waves of ballistic missile strikes overnight. Two people were killed, and four districts of the city were hit. In Kremenchuk, strikes on a residential area killed two people.

Statements from Kyiv and Moscow

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, commenting on the attack, said the Russian army's "birthday present" to Putin was the destruction of an apartment building in Pryluky. Putin turned 74 on October 7. Zelensky said the main target of the massive strike was energy infrastructure, and that the Russians wanted to hit "painfully and demonstratively."

Russia's Defense Ministry said in its daily report that the strikes targeted military facilities, including a drone assembly workshop and a plant assembling "Flamingo" missiles in Kyiv, a factory producing unmanned boats in the Odesa region, and a workshop making drone components in the Kirovohrad region. The ministry did not report any strikes on energy infrastructure. It claimed the Pryluky target was an industrial facility that produces and stores components for "Flamingo" missiles.