A series of Russian air strikes on the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy has damaged residential areas, injuring at least 11 people, including four children, as Ukrainian forces targeted energy infrastructure inside Russia.
Ukraine's Emergency Services wrote on Telegram that Russia had hit a multistory residential building, private homes, and infrastructure facilities.
Ihor Kalchenko, the local governor, said on October 31 that Russian forces had launched 102 attacks on 43 settlements across 13 communities in the Sumy region over the past day, using guided bombs and drones.
Air raid alerts lasted for more than 19 hours, according to Kalchenko. A Sumy resident and eyewitness told RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service that she heard the first explosions shortly before midnight.
"It was around half past eleven. We were already asleep... I saw a flash in the window. I looked out and saw a fire," she said.
"We live in Building 35, but Building 33 is on fire. The ninth-floor windows were engulfed in flames... We checked our apartment and found that the windows in the small bedroom were completely shattered."
Meanwhile, Ukraine's state railway operator, Ukrzaliznytsia, reported that Russian troops had attacked railway infrastructure overnight in the Sumy and Kharkiv regions.
"The Ukrzaliznytsia depot in the city of Sumy has been damaged. This depot provides daily connections to Sumy and the surrounding area. It is an entirely civilian enterprise that prepares carriages for travel and conducts technical inspections," Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba wrote on Telegram.
Kuleba condemned the Russian strikes, calling them “deliberate attacks on the lives of Ukrainians and on the country’s transport system.”
In his evening address on October 30, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the Russian strike on the Slovyansk Thermal Power Plant in northern Donetsk Oblast killed two people and injured several others.
"This is outright terror. Normal people don't wage war like this, and the world must respond appropriately to such Russian warfare," Zelenskyy added.
On October 31, the Ukrainian Air Force reported that Russia had launched one Iskander-M missile and 145 drones.
Ukrainian defenses intercepted one ballistic missile and shot down 107 drones, the statement added.
Ukraine Attacks 'Critical' Energy Facilities In Russia
As the Russian Defense Ministry said that 130 Ukrainian drones were intercepted over Russian territory overnight on October 31, authorities in the southwestern Oryol region claimed that a local power plant had been attacked.
Governor Andrey Klychkov said on Telegram that parts of one intercepted drone fell on the plant, causing power outages and heating problems in some parts of the city of Oryol.
The Ukrainian Navy, however, claimed it had hit the facility with domestically made Neptune cruise missiles, famous for sinking the Moskva guided-missile cruiser, the flagship of Russia's Black Sea fleet, back in 2022.
The Ukrainian Navy's statement added that the electrical substation in Russia's Bryansk region was also hit overnight, saying that "both facilities supplied power to regional military enterprises."
Weeks earlier, while discussing potential US missile supplies to Ukraine in the White House, Zelenskyy said that the combined nature of long-range attacks has been shaping warfare in recent years.
ASTRA, a Russian-language news channel on Telegram, shared footage appearing to show a power plant being hit, reporting that residents of Oryol heard explosions overnight.
ASTRA also reported attacks on a substation in the city of Vladimir in central Russia and an oil refinery near Yaroslavl on the Volga River.
Meanwhile, the head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced that the country has successfully hit 160 Russian oil and energy facilities so far this year.
Vasyl Malyuk told reporters on October 31 that the strikes would continue and are intended to reduce Russia's ability to finance its war in Ukraine.
