Ukraine Launches One of War's Largest Drone Attacks on Russia, Killing at Least Six

Ukraine unleashed one of its biggest aerial assaults of the nearly four-and-a-half-year war on Russia in the early hours of Sunday, sending hundreds of drones across the country and killing at least six people, according to regional Russian officials and international wire reports.

Hundreds of Drones, Dozens of Targets

Russia's Ministry of Defence said its air defences intercepted 822 Ukrainian drones overnight, underscoring the scale of the assault. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said roughly 600 drones had been detected heading toward the Russian capital alone, with about a third of those shot down over the Moscow region before they could reach the city.

Despite the interceptions, the strikes still found their mark in several places. In the town of Podolsk, southwest of Moscow, a Ukrainian drone sparked a fire at a warehouse belonging to Wildberries, Russia's largest online retailer, according to regional governor Andrey Vorobyov, who shared images showing thick columns of black smoke rising from the site. Vorobyov also confirmed that an 83-year-old man was killed when a drone struck a private home elsewhere in the Moscow region.

Further south, a barrage of more than 150 drones targeted three towns in Russia's Rostov region, which borders Ukraine. Regional governor Yury Slyusar said the attack killed five people, damaged multiple homes and a railway station, and ignited a forest fire.

Part of a Wider Campaign

The overnight assault fits a pattern that has intensified through 2026, with Ukraine increasingly relying on long-range missiles and drone swarms to strike Russian military production sites, energy infrastructure and logistics hubs. Wildberries' sprawling depots have been hit repeatedly this year, with Ukrainian officials framing the strikes as an effort to disrupt supply chains that support the Russian war effort while bringing the conflict's costs home to ordinary Russians.

Russia Struck Back at Ukraine

The exchange of fire went both ways. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said a Russian missile strike on the city of Kryvyi Rih killed two people and wounded 14 others, while one more person was reported killed in the city of Sumy. Separately, a Russian attack on Kyiv ignited fires across the Ukrainian capital and left six people injured.

Zelenskyy, writing on social media, said Russian forces continued to strike civilian infrastructure wherever their ballistic missiles could reach, adding that air raid alerts had persisted across multiple regions through the morning as fresh waves of drones were launched.

Why It Matters

Sunday's exchange is among the most intense single-day escalations of the war in recent months and comes as diplomatic efforts to reach a ceasefire remain stalled. The scale of the Ukrainian strike — with over 800 drones intercepted by Russia's own count — signals Kyiv's growing domestic drone-manufacturing capacity, even as Russia continues to press its own missile and drone campaign against Ukrainian cities. Neither side has indicated any near-term let-up, keeping energy markets, European security planners and global investors focused on the risk of further escalation.

This article is an original editorial summary based on publicly reported information. It has been independently written for publication and does not reproduce content from any single source.