Blasts heard in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities amid mass missile strikes

Russia launched a missile attack on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities on Wednesday morning, Ukraine’s air force said, killing one person in the south and triggering air defence systems in the capital, where several blasts were heard.

Two loud explosions were heard in the centre of the city at around 7am, with at least two more 45 minutes later on, the Kyiv Post reported. One of its reporters heard air defences engaging multiple projectiles and saw one in-air explosion.

Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said that air defence systems were engaged and urged people to stay in their shelters. He said later medics were attending one victim in the Dnipro district of the capital.

Two high-voltage lines in the capital had been damaged by rocket fragments, Klitschko said, knocking out power in some areas.

A missile attack further south in Mykolaiv killed one person and damaged at least 20 residential buildings, with some injuries reported, the mayor of the city, Oleksandr Sienkevych, said.

“There are damaged residential buildings. About 20 of them are without roofs. Damage to gas and water supply networks is already being eliminated by utility workers. There are wounded. One person is hospitalised. Others were helped on the spot,” he wrote on Telegram before adding that the hospitalised man had died.

Oleh Sinehubov, governor of the Kharkiv region in Ukraine’s north-east, said Russian missiles struck non-residential infrastructure in Kharkiv city, the administrative centre of the region.

All of Ukraine came under an air raid alert from around 6am on Wednesday, with Ukraine’s air force warning on Telegram of a risk of a Russian missile attack.

Strikes were also reported in the Nikolaev and Lviv regions

This is a developing news story, please check back for updates