A young Kyiv woman narrowly escaped death as a Russian missile exploded nearby while she was messaging her friends.
The young woman held her hand over her mouth in shock as she heard the missiles fly over the city before one hit a building nearby causing her to run away from the scene.
The footage came as a Ukrainian ministry adviser said at least eight people have been killed and 24 injured in a Russian strike on Kyiv while the country’s military chief said 45 missiles were fired earlier this morning.
General Valerii Zaluzhnyi tweeted that 41 of these were neutralised by air defences.
The slew of strikes follows a damaging blow to Russia over the weekend, when the Kerch Bridge, a vital supply line to troops fighting in Ukraine’s south, was damaged in a blast. Vladimir Putin called the incident an “act of terrorism” by Ukraine.
Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba added that the missile strikes across Ukraine on Monday showed Mr Putin “is a terrorist who talks with missiles”.
“Multiple Russian missile strikes across Ukraine. Putin’s only tactic is terror on peaceful Ukrainian cities, but he will not break Ukraine down. This is also his response to all appeasers who want to talk with him about peace: Putin is a terrorist who talks with missiles,” Mr Kuleba wrote on Twitter
As the missiles flew over, the young woman can be heard saying “I just saw a rocket fly. I heard it” before she becomes inaudible. The impact of the explosion is seen as the woman was pushed forward by the blast’s shockwave while the red glow of flames can be seen behind her and on her face. She then ducks down and covers her head as debris flew over her.
“The capital is under attack from Russian terrorists! The missiles hit objects in the city centre (in the Shevchenkivskyi district) and in the Solomyanskyi district. The air raids sirens are going off, and therefore the threat, continues,” mayor Vitali Klitschko posted on social media.
“The central streets of Kyiv have been blocked by law enforcement officers, rescue services are working.”
He later said important infrastructure had been hit.
Mr Zelensky claimed Russia targeted key energy infrastructure in the strikes across the country. Energy facilities in Kyiv, Lviv, Dnipro, Vinnytsia, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, and other regions have been hit, he said in a Telegram post.
“They want panic and chaos, they want to destroy our energy system. They are hopeless,” he said. The second target is people, he added
The strikes came two days after an explosion damaged the only bridge over the Kerch Strait to the Crimea peninsula, which Mr Putin on Sunday called “an act of terrorism aimed at destroying critically important civilian infrastructure”.
“This was devised, carried out and ordered by the Ukrainian special services,” he said in a video on the Kremlin’s Telegram channel.
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the blast on the bridge but has celebrated it. Senior Russian officials demanded a swift response from the Kremlin ahead of a meeting of Mr Putin’s security council on Monday.
