In the early hours of November 19, the Russian military launched a mass drone attack on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, striking the Slobidskyi, Osnovianskyi and Nemyshlianskyi districts. The head of the Kharkiv regional military administration, Oleg Sinegubov, said Russia used 19 Geran-2 UAVs for the assault.
“Over the past 24 hours, Kharkiv and eight settlements in the Kharkiv region came under enemy fire. Forty-six people were injured in Kharkiv, including two children — girls aged 9 and 13,” the official said.
According to him, the following civilian infrastructure in the city was damaged or destroyed: 16 apartment buildings, 31 cars, a garage complex, an emergency medical substation, a supermarket, two trolleybuses, a non-residential building, an administrative building and a school.
Overnight, Russian forces also struck Ukraine’s western regions. EU Ambassador to Ukraine Katarina Mathernova gave an emotional account on Facebook of the combined Russian attack that, in Ternopil alone, left at least 10 people dead.
“Ukraine was burning and suffering. Today’s Russian attacks were aimed primarily at Ukraine’s western regions and Kharkiv. With 470 drones and 48 missiles!!” the EU envoy wrote.
“In the Ivano-Frankivsk and Lviv regions, numerous energy facilities were affected… Ternopil witnessed a true hell. Ten deaths have been confirmed, dozens injured. As heroic rescue services break through the rubble, the toll may still rise,” Mathernova noted.
“Friends of the dead described a night that ‘cannot be forgotten’ — chaos, fire, screams, collapsed residential buildings. This is the reality of Russian terror, deliberately targeting civilians. This is not fighting an army. This is an attempt to wipe people off the face of the earth,” she emphasized.
“Ukraine is under constant fire. Civilians are dying, the energy system is being damaged, and winter is approaching. And yet Ukraine continues to fight — for all of us,” the EU diplomat stressed.
Air Force spokesperson Yurii Ihnat said that, according to preliminary data, a Kh-101 missile struck a high-rise building in Ternopil.
“These were Kh-101 missiles, Kalibr missiles and one ballistic missile, which in the end was launched from the northern direction. Thus, there were no launches from strategic aviation,” he said on the air of Kyiv24. However, Ihnat added, official data are needed after analysis and inspection.
