Death Toll Reaches 31 After Russian Strike on Ukrainian Aid Site as Search for Missing Continues

The death toll from a Russian attack on a site in southern Ukraine where people had gathered to receive humanitarian aid rose to 31 on Tuesday, with dozens of people still missing, according to the Associated Press. Teams of rescuers and volunteers continued to search the cratered blast site of a destroyed aid facility and shelter in Komyshuvakha, a village in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region, hoping to find more than 45 missing residents alive under the rubble.

“The scale of the tragedy is terrifying,” Mykhailo Semikin, acting head of the region’s military administration, wrote in an online post. “This is one of the worst tragedies in terms of the number of civilian victims in our region since the start of the full-scale war.” The dead included four police officers and two rescue workers, Semikin said Tuesday. At least five people were hurt.

Three days of mourning were declared in Zaporizhzhia, where Russian bunker-busting bombs filled with nearly 1.5 tons of explosives were used in Monday’s attack, according to the Associated Press. The attack came as part of a wider overnight barrage: Russia launched 289 attack drones, 17 ballistic missiles and 59 cruise missiles across nine regions, triggering emergency power cuts, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an online post that noted the barrage coincided with United States elections.

Hospitals and power plants hit across Ukraine

In the northeast region of Kharkiv, a combined Russian missile and drone attack wounded at least 62 people, local authorities said. A strike damaged a medical facility in the Nemyshlianskyi district, shattered windows in four apartment buildings and damaged cars, and more than 200 patients were transferred to other medical facilities, said Oleh Syniehubov, head of the regional military administration.

In the Dnipro area, rescuers pulled a woman alive from the rubble on Tuesday morning, after a Russian attack killed one person and wounded 17, local authorities said. The attack damaged an outpatient clinic and a hospital, and patients were transferred to other hospitals, said Oleksandr Hanzha, head of the regional military administration.

Moscow kept up its nightly attacks on power plants and energy infrastructure ahead of winter, carrying out 20 strikes in 10 regions overnight, Ukraine’s energy ministry said. Ukrainian power utility DTEK said three of its power plants halted operations after serious damage from intense attacks, and no injuries were reported. Rolling blackouts were put in place in the south, west and east of Russian-occupied Crimea following attacks on energy infrastructure, Moscow-installed officials said.

Russia’s Ministry of Defense said Tuesday that it had shot down 856 Ukrainian drones overnight, and Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said 493 drones were fired toward the Russian capital. A Ukrainian drone attack wounded two employees at an oil refinery in the Russian city of Yaroslavl, regional Gov. Mikhail Yevrayev said, adding that there was damage to the refinery’s infrastructure.

“The Russians think America won’t notice this signal of theirs,” Zelenskyy said. “But we need to notice and stop such terror. We need to help Ukraine defend its skies; otherwise, Russia will never stop its missile strikes.”

Reporting based on coverage by The Associated Press.