**Russia Pounds Ukraine with Missiles and Drones for Second Consecutive Day, Kyiv Reports**
*By Running News Today*
*August 27, 2024*
Russia unleashed a fresh wave of missile and drone attacks across multiple regions in Ukraine on Tuesday, marking the second consecutive day of heavy bombardment. According to Ukrainian military sources, at least four people were killed in the onslaught, which follows Moscow's largest air offensive of the war to date.
The attacks on Tuesday primarily targeted central and eastern Ukrainian cities, including Kryvyi Rih and Zaporizhzhia. In Kryvyi Rih, a hotel was obliterated by a missile strike, resulting in two fatalities and several injuries. Meanwhile, in Zaporizhzhia, two more civilians were killed, and four were wounded during a drone assault using Iranian-made Shahed drones, local officials said.
Kyiv, the capital, was also subjected to multiple rounds of missile and drone attacks throughout the night. According to eyewitness reports, air defence systems were activated several times as explosions were heard across the city. The strikes come on the heels of Russia’s barrage of over 200 missiles and drones on Monday, which left at least seven dead and caused significant damage to Ukraine's energy infrastructure.
U.S. President Joe Biden condemned the recent Russian air raids as "outrageous," while the Ukrainian government continues to assess the damage across various regions. Despite the intensity of the attacks, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, expressed scepticism over Russia’s ability to sustain such large-scale operations regularly, citing limitations in its defence-industrial capacity.
Several pro-Russian military bloggers, including the prominent collective known as Rybar, described the recent missile and drone strikes as retaliation for Ukraine’s incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, the first major cross-border operation since World War II. Despite these retaliatory strikes, Kyiv claims to have made further advances in the area, defying Moscow's attempts to repel Ukrainian forces.
The Kremlin, while denying that it targets civilians, maintains that the attacks have successfully hit critical energy infrastructure in Ukraine. On Monday, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that all designated targets had been hit, though these claims have not been independently verified.
As of Tuesday morning, the full scale and impact of the attacks were still being evaluated. Ukraine’s air force reported the launch of several groups of drones and the departure of Russian strategic bombers and supersonic interceptor aircraft from airfields in Russia, raising concerns about the possibility of continued assaults.
Air raid alerts were issued across Kryvyi Rih, Kyiv, and various central and eastern regions of Ukraine throughout Monday night, with local officials warning of the possibility of more strikes. In Kryvyi Rih, search and rescue operations continued as officials reported that two civilians might still be trapped under the rubble of the destroyed hotel. In addition to the fatalities, six shops, four high-rise buildings, and eight vehicles were also damaged, according to Dnipropetrovsk Governor Serhiy Lisak.
The situation in Zaporizhzhia was similarly dire, with Governor Ivan Fedorov describing the overnight drone attacks as devastating. "Such are the consequences of the overnight attack by Shaheds on Zaporizhzhia," he said in a Telegram post, referencing the Iranian-made kamikaze drones that Russia has frequently deployed in its assault on Ukraine.
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