Russia launches a massive attack on Ukraine’s power grid plunging thousands into darkness

Sustained Russian attacks on Ukraine’s power grid in recent weeks have forced leaders of the war-ravaged country to institute nationwide rolling blackouts.

The Russian airstrikes targeting the grid since March have meant blackouts have even returned to the capital, Kyiv, which hadn’t experienced them since the first year of the war.

Among the strikes were an April barrage that damaged Kyiv’s largest thermal power plant and a massive attack on May 8 that targeted power generation and transmission facilities in several regions.

In all, half of Ukraine’s energy system was damaged, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

Entire apartment blocks in the capital went dark. The city’s military administration said at least 10 percent of consumers were disconnected.

Before dawn Wednesday, a Russian drone attack on Sumy plunged the northern Ukraine city into darkness.

Some power was restored to the city of around a quarter-million people in the morning as crews rushed to repair the damage, local authorities said.

Ukraine is appealing to Western allies for more air defence systems and spare parts to fix its Soviet-era plants.

“With each attack we lose additional power generation, so it just goes minus, minus, minus,” Halushchenko said on Tuesday, as he stood outside a coal-fired plant in central Ukraine that was destroyed in an attack on April 11.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock joined him on the plant visit, underscoring Ukraine’s desperation to close the power gap as quickly as possible.

Russian strikes have been well-documented against hospitals, schools, maternity wards and theatres, not just on energy infrastructure.

Experts have called it an age-old war strategy for Russia designed to pressure and isolate Ukrainian civilians.

The plan for winter is to restore power generation as much as possible, according to energy minister Harkavyi. How that will happen isn’t clear, he conceded: “The situation is already too difficult.”