A large Russian drone and missile barrage on Ukraine’s western city of Ternopil killed at least 25 people, including three children, authorities said on November 19.
The nighttime attack hit two nine-story apartment blocks in Ternopil, located around 120 miles from the Polish border, according to Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko. At least 73 people, including 15 children, were injured, emergency services said.
Milwaukee Independent previously reported from Ternopil in May 2022 while traveling through western Ukraine on the way to Milwaukee’s sister city of Irpin, documenting how the region had become a key transit corridor for civilians and aid workers escaping the brutality of Putin’s unprovoked full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022.
At the time, local officials stressed that Ternopil’s relative quiet and distance were deceptive, warning that no part of Ukraine was beyond the reach of Russian missiles. It was a concern that has materialized yet again with deadly force.
At least 19 among those killed were burned alive, including three children aged 5, 7, and 16, Klymenko said. Two dozen people are still unaccounted for, he said on national television, and rescuers expect to work at least two more days to complete the search of rubble.
Russia fired 476 strike and decoy drones, as well as 48 missiles of various types, at Ukrainian targets overnight, Ukraine’s air force said. The bombardment included 47 cruise missiles, with air defenses intercepting all but six of them, the air force said. Western-supplied F-16 and Mirage-2000 jets intercepted at least 10 cruise missiles, it said.
“Every brazen attack against ordinary life indicates that the pressure on Russia (to stop the war) is insufficient,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on the messaging app Telegram.
ROMANIA AND POLAND SCRAMBLE FIGHTER JETS
Ternopil sits in a part of relatively peaceful western Ukraine, where many people from the east and south moved to as they fled danger along the front line. Almost 50 people were injured in Russian strikes on three other Ukrainian regions.
Two Eurofighter Typhoon jets and two F-16s were scrambled in Romania when a drone entered the NATO member’s airspace during the Russian attacks, Romania’s Ministry of National Defense said.
The Polish military said that Polish and allied aircraft were deployed in the middle of the night as a preventive measure. Poland’s Rzeszów and Lublin airports were closed temporarily to prioritize military aviation, the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency said.
In northeastern Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, Russian drones injured 46 people, including two girls, the head of the regional military administration, Oleh Syniehubov, wrote on Telegram. Drones hit several city districts, at least 16 residential buildings, an ambulance station, school, and other civilian infrastructure, he said.
