Three people have been killed in a Russian air strike on Kyiv overnight, Ukrainian officials have said.
Residents in the city first heard two loud explosions and only then the wail of the air raid siren, around 06:00 local time (04:00 GMT). The missiles had already hit by the time the ballistic threat warning was issued, urging residents to head for shelter.
The attack struck the central Shevchenkivskyi district, where there is now a deep crater in the road outside a business centre.
A military factory in the neighbourhood has been targeted repeatedly by Russia, but civilian buildings appear to have been damaged. An official said a couple had been killed on the street inside their vehicle.
Officials earlier reported four people had died in the attack.
The metro station, nearby restarants and businesses are also very badly damaged, and emergency workers are removing the burned wreckage of cars from the scene.
Already damaged in previous attacks on this area, the business centre’s tall glass tower and main building are now a shell after being hit by either a second missile or very large fragment. It was empty when the missile struck.
Beside the main crater, a Ukrainian forensics expert examined fragments of missile collected into a heap of twisted grey metal on the pavement.
Andriy Kulchytskyy, the head of the Military Research Laboratory of the Kyiv Institute of Scientific Expertise, told the BBC the crater was from a direct hit with an Iskander-M ballistic missile, based on markings on the missile fragments.
“This specific site shows one impact,” he explained. “There are additional strikes, and we have collected debris. Here, the missile directly hit the road.”
Mr Kulchytskyy said the projectile landed before the warning sirens sounded because ballistic missiles travel so quickly that the sirens cannot react in time.
Beside the road, a cake shop has had its front blown off, covering pastries and pies in shattered glass.
A dental clinic next door has been destroyed in the blast. Inside, staff are trying to recover what’s still intact among the wreckage.
One woman was removing baubles from a plastic Christmas tree that was still standing.
“It’s happened before,” she told the BBC, “but never as badly as this”.
Asked how she felt, she shrugged: “We got used to it.”
“There were three explosions in a row, then a big fire glow in the sky – and the building shook. It was very loud,” a young man called Oleksandr said while exiting a nearby block of flats.
“I woke up immediately – I even felt the wall shaking. When the third strike came, it was pretty scary.”
On Saturday morning, the main road has been cordoned off – but a few hours after the strike the neighbouring streets nearby are already busy with traffic. Old ladies are selling chickens and gherkins outside the market, and there are joggers and people walking their dogs.
But a pensioner passing by told us she was terrified.
“I didn’t know where to run, because you normally go to the metro for shelter – but it was on fire.”
It is the second fatal attack on Kyiv this month, following a strike on the city on New Year’s Day that left two people dead.
Meanwhile, in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, local authorities say six people were wounded in a Russian strike on Saturday. One woman is said to be in a serious condition.
These strikes are the latest in the war that began following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
They follow several Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory earlier in the week.
The latest strikes take place just days before the imminent inauguration of Donald Trump in the US, with many Ukrainians concerned by Trump’s pledge to reduce US military and financial aid to the embattled country.
The president-elect had claimed during the campaign that he would end the conflict on the first day of his presidency, though he has since said that he may need six months.
In recent days, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has reiterated the country’s dependence on US support as Russian air strikes and fighting on the front line continue.
