Russian ballistic missiles hit Kyiv's Darnytska CHPP-4 overnight on 13–14 October. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine said a key energy facility supplying Kyiv with heating and electricity has been hit in a Russian ballistic missile attack. [E1] The BBC reported that Darnytska CHP-4, or CHPP-4, was hit in a strike the president said came with "no early warning from our partners". [E2] Kyiv Post reported Zelenskyy said the main target was CHP-4, one of the capital's most important energy facilities, and confirmed that Russian missiles had hit the site. [E3]
Several power plants were targeted in the capital, an energy official speaking under condition of anonymity told the Kyiv Independent. [E4] Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said several "energy facilities" were struck in the attack. [E5][E10]
The Kyiv Independent reported Zelenskyy said overnight the Russians deployed 39 ballistic missiles and more than 120 strike drones and loitering munitions against energy and critical infrastructure in Kyiv, Kyiv Oblast, and Kharkiv, adding 600,000 people were currently without power. "This was a targeted Russian ballistic strike specifically against the energy sector — an area regarding which the U.S. President had called for a ceasefire." He said the strike was entirely deliberate and demonstrative in its scale, and that Russia has never before shown such blatant disrespect toward America. [E6][E7][E8]
Radio Svoboda reported DTEK said on Telegram that the Russian attack caused emergency power cuts in Kyiv's Darnytskyi, Dniprovskyi, Pechersk, Solomianskyi and part of Holosiivskyi districts. Stabilization schedules in those districts are temporarily not in effect, and the company said energy workers are already working to restore power to all homes as quickly as possible. City authorities said some electric transport is temporarily not running. [E9][E10]
Glavcom, citing DTEK, reported that a network accident left part of Kyiv's right bank without power. [E14]
Australian Associated Press, carrying Reuters, reported on Tuesday that Russia has hit no Ukrainian energy targets for the first time since President Donald Trump of the United States announced an "energy ceasefire". [E11] On 13 October this paper printed that Tuesday zero after Monday's six. The same AAP report said Russia struck six Ukrainian energy sites on Monday. [E12]
Associated Press reported that Trump claimed Sunday that Russia and Ukraine had agreed on an “energy ceasefire” in which both parties would refrain from striking each other’s energy infrastructure. Russia has not confirmed the existence of such a deal. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said only that “contacts on this matter continue.” [E13] TSN reported Peskov said this proposal had not been concretized. [E15]
The desk's reading. Wednesday's ballistic strike on Darnytska CHPP-4 breaks this paper's Tuesday finding that Russia hit no Ukrainian energy sites, so the halt is not in force at a named heating-and-power plant. Remaining generation at CHPP-4 has not been published. The competing reading is that Tuesday's zero was a one-cycle pause and that CHPP-4 is still generating.
The next test. Nothing yet would come out differently under the two readings. A DTEK line that CHPP-4 is still generating would accept the hit. A published outage or derate at the plant, or another named energy site in the next Russian package, would leave the strike in place; none of those overturns the halt reading.