Kyiv under fire: strikes of early August 2026

What did the days leading up to 10 August 2026 look like for Kyiv? They were marked by Russian strikes that killed civilians and exposed gaps in air defence.

On 5 August, Russian forces launched dozens of ballistic missiles and drones at Kyiv, killing at least 17 people and wounding dozens more. Eight of the dead were civilians at a railway station in Kyiv Oblast. According to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, none of the missiles was intercepted by Ukrainian forces because of a shortage of Patriot missiles.

On 8 August, Zelenskyy reported that a Russian drone strike in Kyiv had killed a 3-year-old boy and his grandparents.

Taken together, the two reports described a pattern of attacks on the capital and its surrounding region in the first part of the month, with civilian casualties in both cases. The president tied the missed interceptions on 5 August to the lack of Patriot missiles.