A Russian jet-powered “Shahed” drone struck the locomotive of a passenger train in the Odesa region on Sunday, Aug. 23, but an emergency evacuation prevented any casualties.
Ukrzaliznytsia (Ukrainian Railways) Chairman Oleksandr Pertsovskyi confirmed that the drone hit train No. 147, traveling from Zhytomyr to Odesa.
“The Ukrzaliznytsia monitoring team announced an evacuation in advance, and the train was urgently stopped on the track, so everyone is safe: the passengers, the train crew, and the locomotive crew,” Pertsovskyi said.
The train was carrying 593 passengers, including 15 children, at the time of the attack. Ukrzaliznytsia is currently organizing alternative transportation to bring the passengers to Odesa.
Later, Oleg Kipper, head of the Odesa Regional State Administration, reported that Russian forces struck the Zhytomyr-Odesa passenger train for the second time. There were no casualties, and all passengers were transported to Odesa.
Ongoing strikes across Ukraine
The attack on the passenger train is part of a broader wave of deadly Russian strikes across multiple Ukrainian regions over the weekend.
Also on Aug. 23, a Russian attack on the settlement of Sofiivka in the Kramatorsk community of the Donetsk region killed two people and injured two others. The State Emergency Service (SES) reported that the strike damaged 141 private houses.
During search-and-rescue operations in Sofiivka, emergency workers recovered the body of one victim from under the rubble. Firefighters extinguished a blaze in an outbuilding and localized fires at a private home, two civilian vehicles, and the damaged structural elements of another house.
However, the SES reported that firefighting efforts had to be suspended due to the threat of repeated Russian shelling.
Early Sunday morning, a Russian jet-powered “Shahed” drone struck a residential area in the Osnovyanskyi district of Kharkiv. The strike injured eight people, including a 15-year-old boy who suffered an acute stress reaction, and sparked fires in private homes and an outbuilding.
On the afternoon of Saturday, Aug. 22, a Russian ballistic missile strike in the Boryspil district of the Kyiv region killed two people and injured five others. The strike damaged a warehouse, a car parking lot, multiple vehicles, a private household, and a gas station.
In a separate series of attacks on Saturday, Russian forces launched seven strikes on the Zaporizhzhia district, killing three people and injuring 15 others, including a child, while also causing damage to several private houses in the area.