For more than 12 harrowing hours overnight from September 28 to 29, 2025, the people of Ukraine endured one of the most intense and wide-ranging missile and drone attacks since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022. The skies above Ukrainian cities blared with air raid sirens as hundreds of Russian-launched missiles and suicide drones rained down, shattering the fragile sense of safety in urban centers and rural villages alike.
According to the Ukrainian Air Force, Russia fired a staggering 595 to 643 munitions—including cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and nearly 600 drones—targeting not only military infrastructure but also residential neighborhoods, hospitals, and even kindergartens. The capital, Kyiv, bore the brunt of the assault, with officials confirming at least four fatalities, among them a 12-year-old girl. Across the country, at least 70 people were wounded, and more than 100 civilian structures were damaged in what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned as a “vile” and “brutal” bombardment.
“A massive Russian attack on Ukraine lasted for more than 12 hours. Savage strikes, a deliberate, targeted terror against ordinary cities—nearly 500 attack drones and over 40 missiles,” Zelenskyy wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “As of now, four people have been reported killed in Kyiv, including a 12-year-old girl. My condolences to all the families and loved ones. Across Ukraine, at least 40 people are known to have been injured, including children.” Later, Ukraine’s Interior Ministry updated the number of wounded to 70.
In one particularly heartbreaking incident, a family of four—a married couple and their two young sons, aged four and six—were killed when a Russian drone struck their home in the village of Chernechchyna in the Sumy region. “A tragedy that we will never forget or forgive,” said regional head Oleh Hryhorov, as emergency crews pulled the bodies from the wreckage. The attack also partially destroyed two residential buildings in the village, with photos showing firefighters battling flames in the aftermath.
The barrage marked the first major bombardment since a previous attack killed at least 21 people earlier in the month. Tymur Tkachenko, head of the Kyiv City Administration, noted that the strikes damaged more than 20 sites in the city, including residential buildings, a medical facility, and a kindergarten. Eyewitnesses at Kyiv’s central train station described a tense environment, with anxious passengers huddled together as air raid alerts pierced the night.
Ukrainian air defenses, equipped with Western-supplied systems like the MIM-104 Patriot, IRIS-T, and NASAMS, managed to intercept or jam the majority of the incoming munitions. Out of the 595 to 643 projectiles and drones, approximately 611 were shot down, including 566 drones, 35 Kh-101 cruise missiles, eight Kalibr cruise missiles, and two drone-launched Banderol missiles. Still, dozens of missiles and drones slipped through, striking at least 16 locations across Ukraine, including Zaporizhia, Khmelnytskyi, Sumy, Mykolaiv, Chernihiv, and Odesa oblasts.
Despite the effectiveness of Ukraine’s layered air defense, the scale and persistence of Russian attacks have exposed critical vulnerabilities. “Russian strikes are increasingly and disproportionately impacting civilian areas in Russia’s significantly larger-scale strike packages of recent months and that such strikes underscore Ukraine’s need for continued supply of Western air defense systems, especially US-provided Patriot systems,” assessed the Institute for the Study of War in its latest estimate. The Ukrainian military has repeatedly called for more advanced air defense systems and additional munitions to replenish stocks depleted by near-daily assaults.
Russia’s own missile stocks, meanwhile, have been strained by international sanctions and battlefield losses. This has forced Moscow to depend more heavily on imported drones, barter with pariah states, and employ a wide mix of munitions to sustain its campaign of terror from the sky. The Russian Defense Ministry claimed its air defenses intercepted 41 Ukrainian drones during the same period, though Ukraine’s drone attacks have not caused casualties on Russian soil, according to Russian sources.
The international ramifications of the latest onslaught were immediate. Poland scrambled fighter jets as a precaution after Russian drones landed near its territory, and recent incursions into Estonian airspace have heightened fears that the conflict could spill beyond Ukraine’s borders. Denmark, too, reported drone sightings at several armed forces locations for the second consecutive day, prompting officials to call for a ban on civilian drone flights and raising concerns about broader security in northern Europe. “We cannot accept that foreign drones create uncertainty and disruption in society as we have experienced recently,” Denmark’s transport minister Thomas Danielsen said, as the country prepared to host a major EU summit.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha described the Russian offensive as involving “hundreds of drones and missiles” and urged the international community to escalate the costs for Russia’s military actions. President Zelenskyy, in turn, called for the world to apply the “toughest pressure” on Moscow, including cutting off Russian energy revenues that help fund the war. “The time for decisive action is long overdue, and we count on a strong response from the United States, Europe, the G7, and the G20,” he said on Telegram.
In the midst of the devastation, Ukraine announced a USD 90 billion arms deal with the United States, which includes procurement of Ukrainian-made drones. The European Commission also pledged a €2 billion package to help Ukraine scale up its drone capacity, with President Ursula von der Leyen stating, “This allows Ukraine to scale up and to use its full capacity. And of course, it will also allow the European Union to benefit from this technology.”
The United States is considering Ukraine’s request for long-range Tomahawk missiles, which, if delivered, would put Moscow and other Russian cities within reach of Ukrainian forces. US Vice President JD Vance confirmed that Washington is reviewing the request, though the final decision rests with President Donald Trump. Such a move would almost certainly be viewed by Russia as an escalation, intensifying the already fraught dynamics of the conflict.
On the ground, the human toll continues to mount. Residents of Kyiv and other cities sifted through the rubble of destroyed homes, while emergency services worked tirelessly to clear debris and restore essential services. “The Russians have restarted the child death counter,” Tkachenko wrote on Telegram, a grim reminder of the war’s relentless cost to Ukraine’s youngest and most vulnerable.
As Russia’s aerial campaign intensifies and concerns grow about the conflict’s potential to spill into neighboring countries, Ukraine’s plea for more robust international support grows ever more urgent. The resilience of its people is clear, but so too is the scale of the threat they face with each passing night.