At least 37 people were killed Saturday after a Russian drone strike hit a warehouse in the village of Myla, located in the Bucha district west of Kyiv. The strike triggered a large-scale fire and subsequent detonations that damaged at least 50 residential buildings and a care home for the elderly and people with disabilities. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed that authorities have opened a criminal investigation into potential negligence regarding the storage of ammunition near civilian areas, which is prohibited under Ukrainian law.
The incident follows a similar event in July in the Kyiv suburb of Vyshneve, where an attack on a munitions depot killed 22 people. Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi stated that the previous tragedy had not served as a sufficient lesson and characterized the repeated storage of explosives near homes as criminal negligence. Zelenskyy later announced that two officials from state-owned companies, including the arms producer Ukroboronprom, would be held accountable for illegal weapons storage at the Vyshneve site.
Russia's Ministry of Defense issued a statement claiming the Myla strike successfully hit a warehouse containing components and launch boosters for long-range drones. The ministry also reported additional strikes on the ports of Mykolaiv and Izmail, as well as facilities in the Kyiv region allegedly housing parts for Flamingo cruise missiles. Separately, Russian officials reported that Ukrainian drone attacks in the Rostov region wounded 11 people, while Ukrainian officials stated Russian strikes in Kherson killed two people and wounded 27.
The scale of the casualties—37 deaths in a single strike—marks one of the deadliest events in the Kyiv region this year. For the broader Ukrainian population, the incident highlights ongoing risks associated with military logistics in civilian areas; the Prime Minister's comments suggest a systemic failure to enforce safety regulations despite previous fatal accidents. Residents in the southern Kherson region face additional strain as local authorities warned tens of thousands of people to relocate to avoid anticipated winter power and heating outages caused by intensified strikes on critical infrastructure.
The legal fallout involves state-owned enterprises like Ukroboronprom, with at least two officials already facing accountability for previous storage violations. Moving forward, the office of Ukraine's prosecutor general is investigating the legality of the Myla facility's permits and its proximity to homes. This sets a precedent for how the Ukrainian government will handle internal liability during wartime. Zelenskyy has stated that Kyiv aims to increase its own long-range capabilities to 1,000 drone launches per day, while Russian forces claimed to have destroyed 313 Ukrainian drones overnight as of Saturday.