Terrified pedestrians were forced to run for cover when Putin’s forces fired a Kalibr missile at a busy city centre yesterday killing 23 people, shocking video shows.
The missile launched from a submarine in the Black Sea crashed down on Vinnytsia at around 10.50am local time injuring at least 100 people.
Footage shows the moment of impact as cyclists and pedestrians were going about their day when suddenly the destructive power of the blast blows them off their bicycles while others cowered and dropped to the ground for safety.
Seconds later, an ominous shadow of darkness suddenly casts a pall across the square as frightened dogs flee the scene.
Terrorised people are seen running to escape the strike unleashed on the city of 370,000 people in the centre of the country, far from the Donbas frontline.
Cyclists and pedestrians were going about their day when suddenly the destructive power of the blast forces them to fall off their bicycles
Seconds later, an ominous shadow of darkness suddenly casts a pall across the square as frightened dogs flee the scene
The missile launched from a submarine in the Black Sea crashed down on Vinnytsia at around 10.50am local time injuring around 100 people and killing 23
Firefighters together with rescuers, military and the police work at the site of the Russian missile strike in downtown Vinnytsia
Emergency services work next to a damaged building at the site of a Russian military strike, as Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, in Vinnytsia
Separate CCTV footage shows a customer in a shop when the Kalibr missile strikes.
She and the shop assistant are thrown to the floor and the windows are smashed by the force of the rocket attack.
President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russia a ‘terrorist’ state, urged more sanctions against the Kremlin and said the death toll in Vinnytsia could rise.
‘Unfortunately, this is not the final number. Debris clearance continues. Dozens of people are reported missing. There are seriously injured (people) among those hospitalised,’ he said in a video address.
Russia reiterated that it does not target civilians in what it calls its ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine, and said its attack struck a military training facility. Reuters could not independently verify battlefield accounts.
Vinnytsia hosts the command headquarters of the Ukrainian Air Force, according to an official Ukrainian military website, a target which Russia used cruise missiles to try to hit in March, the Ukrainian air force said at the time.
Separate CCTV footage shows a customer in a shop when the Kalibr missile strikes
She and the shop assistant are thrown to the floor and the windows are smashed by the force of the rocket attack
Scores of people were wounded in the attack, in which rockets hit a multi-story building in the city’s centre
Ukraine said Thursday’s strike on Vinnytsia, a city of 370,000 people about 125 miles southwest of the capital Kyiv, had been carried out with Kalibr cruise missiles
President Volodymyr Zelensky called Russia a ‘terrorist’ state, urged more sanctions against the Kremlin and said the death toll could rise
Vinnytsya,450 miles went of the Donbas front line, is just the latest city to be hit in a series of Russian air strikes targeting civilians
Among the victims were three children, and the inhumane attack has raised fears that further strikes on civilians are imminent, after the Kremlin’s focus on the Donbas.
Russia has stepped up its attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine as its offensive in the east has stalled following the seizure of two key cities in late June and early July.
Ukraine says Putin’s men are taking an ‘operation pause’ before pushing on with their offensive, but that has not stopped them raining down death from a distance.
The first such strike obliterated the Kremenchuk mall on June 27, killing at least 20 people but leaving another 36 missing presumed dead.
Russia attempted to deny it had hit the mall – suggesting it had fired at nearby military targets including a factory and railway – and that ‘collateral’ damage had been caused by a fire that spread to the shopping centre.
But CCTV footage clearly showed a Russian anti-ship missile, originally designed to take out US aircraft carriers, slamming into the building.
One of the children killed was four-year-old Liza Dmitrieva who had Down’s Syndrome
A Russia Kalibre cruise missile slammed into this office block in Vinnystya, which is hundreds of miles from the closest front line, as Liza and Irina walked past – peppering them both with shrapnel
Irina often posted about her daughter online, saying she was ‘scared to make wishes’ about the future but was looking forward to Liza’s fifth birthday – that she will now never get to celebrate
Liza’s mother Irina, 33, has undergone surgery for life-threatening lung and liver wounds
That was followed by a hit on an apartment block in Mykolaiv on June 29 that left at least eight people dead, and another in Odesa on July 1 that killed 18.
On July 9, Russia bombed an apartment block in the town of Chasiv Yar – killing at least 47 civilian in one of the single deadliest attacks on the innocent of the war.
One of the children killed was four-year-old Liza Dmitrieva who had Down’s Syndrome.
The pink pram that Liza had been filmed pushing an hour earlier was left lying on its side in the middle of the road, spattered in blood from wounds that the little girl tragically did not survive.
Her mother Irina, 33, has undergone surgery for life-threatening lung and liver wounds.
Irina had previously posted on social media about her fears for daughter Liza, saying she was ‘scared to make wishes’ about the future for them and for their country.
Viktor Polishchuk (left) died while Vitaly Kabluchko (right) is in intensive care
Evhen Kovalenko, 25, sound producer for Ukrainian singer Roxolana, who had been due to performing the city last night before his death in the attack
Kateryna Hula (left), 24, the centre’s administrator, was killed, as was the manager Tetyana Kharchenko (right)
Writing about the fifth birthday that little Liza will now never get to experience, she said: ‘It was Covid-19 first, then the war. I have not been able to arrange a proper birthday party for Liza for two years.
‘I am hoping her fifth birthday will give us a chance! I am scared to make wishes. I just dream about peace, and about things going the way we want.’
Just six hours before Liza was killed, she had posted about the progress her daughter had made despite the pandemic and war.
The strike also devastated the Neuromed medical centre, killing two staff and wounding medics, it was revealed.
Children’s neurologist Pavlo Kovalchuk and neurologist Nataliya Falshtynska are in ‘serious’ conditions
Smoke rises from a damaged building following a Russian airstrike in the city of Vinnytsia, west-central Ukraine
Russia has stepped up its attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine as its offensive in the east has stalled following the seizure of two key cities in late June and early July
An empty pram lies in the street after the Russian missile strike, with the child though to have been killed and their mother thought to have been badly injured
Kateryna Hula, 24, the centre’s administrator, was killed, as was the manager Tetyana Kharchenko.
Children’s neurologist Pavlo Kovalchuk and neurologist Nataliya Falshtynska are in ‘serious’ conditions after the submarine-based Kalibr missile strike by Vladimir Putin.
Survivors at the centre told of the ‘unspeakable pain and sadness for all those who suffered’.
The Ukrainian Children’s Neurologists Association posted: ‘One of the best young paediatric neurologists in Ukraine, our colleague Pavlo Vasyliovych Kovalchuk, was severely affected.
‘Now he is in the hospital with numerous burns and shrapnel wounds, and he needs your help.’
Dr Falshtynska, a mother-of-three, suffered brain injury and her legs were ‘completely burned’.
Cars smoulder in front of an office block in the city of Vinnytsya, western Ukraine, after it was struck by three Russian missiles that landed around 10.50am on Thursday
Civilians – including children – are among those killed in the Russian strike, which is the latest to hit residential areas
Russia reiterated that it does not target civilians in what it calls its ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine
Grieving journalist Yurii Hula, brother of the Neuromed administrator, posted. ‘My Katyusha [Kateryna] is gone.
‘She is now forever 24.’
Also killed was Evhen Kovalenko, 25, sound producer for Ukrainian singer Roxolana, who had been due to performing the city last night.
Music band Bratya Gadyukiny issued a statement saying that local people who had helped them were victims of the attack.
‘A mad fascist monster struck the centre of our Vinnytsia. Many people died and were injured.
‘Among them were two men who helped us organise a reception and a performance in front of our soldiers.
‘Vitaly Kabluchko is in intensive care, he is being operated on. Viktor Polishchuk died.’
Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska said she had known tragic Liza, one of the three children brutally killed in the strike.
Vinnytsia hosts the command headquarters of the Ukrainian Air Force, according to an official Ukrainian military website
Ukrainian emergency workers and military work at the site of the Russian missile strike in downtown Vinnytsia
A woman lays flowers and a toy to the military jet monument by the heavily damaged office building
‘We were horrified to see a photo of an overturned pushchair from Vinnytsia. And then, reading the news, I realised that I knew this girl,’ she said.
‘We met while recording a video for the Christmas holidays.’
The tragic girl ‘managed to paint not only herself, her holiday dress, but also all the other children, me, the cameramen and the director…Look at her, alive, please.’
Irina Dmitrieva’s friend Lena Gribova said reports that the mother’s hands or feet had been blown off were wrong, but she had suffered critical wounds.
‘She is alive, is a very grave condition, but alive,’ said the friend.
‘She went through surgery, this the decisive night. If the night goes well – please, God – she will live.
Anton Krasovsky, director of broadcasting for RT and a star presenter and reporter, said he had been to Kherson and Kakhovka and seen devastation caused by recent Ukrainian attacks
‘They operated on her liver and lungs. Her lungs are very, very bad.’
Almost £3,000 had been raised for her medical bills.
One Russian state TV chief claimed yesterday’s death and carnage was ‘too little’ and demanded stronger bombardment in a barbaric address.
Anton Krasovsky, director of broadcasting for RT and a star presenter and reporter, said he had been to Kherson and Kakhovka and seen devastation caused by recent Ukrainian attacks on occupied territory.
‘I was in Kherson and Kakhovka,’ he said.
‘I saw those crying people left with no homes, who lost everything. Vinnytsia is too little! Too little!’
He called for a ‘final decision’ to be made about an even tougher blitzkrieg from Russia – ‘a real one, combat’.
The US embassy in Kyiv issued a security alert warning all Americans to leave Ukraine amid fears of new strikes.
The US said its citizens should ‘leave immediately, via available ground transportation…if it is safe’ due to the ‘missile threat’.
Russia suffered its latest blow as one of Putin’s most senior paratrooper commanders Colonel Andrey Vasilyev was killed
‘The security situation throughout Ukraine is unstable, and… may deteriorate without warning.’
Meanwhile, Russia suffered its latest blow as one of Putin’s most senior paratrooper commanders was killed.
Battle-hardened Colonel Andrey Vasilyev, 49, of the Tula 106th Airborne Division, was killed in a HIMARS attack, it is believed.
He is the 78th Russia colonel to be identified as having died in Putin’s war in Ukraine.
He died alongside Col. Sergey Kuzminov, 40, whose loss was reported earlier.
Both men were deputy commanders of Russia’s famous 106th Airborne Division at Tula.
In 2018, Vasilyev was seen commanding the annual 9 May Victory Day Parade in Tula.
Earlier he had served in Russian military campaigns in Abkhazia and Chechnya.
Both men had been decorated for their ‘courage’ in awards signed off by Putin.
Russia has also lost a dozen generals in the war.