Ukraine’s air defence shot down 54 out of 69 missiles launched by Russia in a new wave of attacks on Thursday morning, the Ukrainian army said.
“According to preliminary data, 69 missiles were launched in total. Fifty four enemy cruise missiles were shot down,” Ukraine’s commander-in-chief General Valeriy Zaluzhny said. Presidential aide Mykhaylo Podolyak said earlier in the day that more than 120 missiles had been fired.

All 16 (100%) of the cruise missiles fired at Kyiv 🇺🇦 were shot down

21 cruise missiles were shot down by Ukrainian Air Defenses over Odesa

5 cruise missiles were shot down over Mykolaiv and the Black Sea pic.twitter.com/RY6cZXsjfC

— Ukraine News 🇺🇦 (@Ukrainene) December 29, 2022

“This morning, the aggressor launched air and sea-based cruise missiles, remotely-guided anti-aircraft missiles and S-300 ADMS against energy infrastructure facilities in our country,” Ukrainian Armed Forces chief General Valeriy Zaluzhny wrote on the Telegram app.

The mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, said that the electricity supply has been interrupted today at noon in almost half of the Ukrainian capital.

“40% of the capital’s consumers are without electricity after the Russian attack,” Klitschko wrote on the Telegram app. He said that the water supply and heating are working smoothly in the capital, except for the apartment buildings that do not have electricity and their burners work with electricity.

Meanwhile, Russian air defense shot down “an unidentified object” near Saratov, 500 kilometers from the Ukrainian border, the regional governor announced, three days after a drone attack attributed to Ukraine that killed three people at an air base in the area.

“An anti-aircraft defence system has been activated on the territory of the Engels district. An unidentified object was destroyed (…) The safety of the residents is not threatened”, Governor Roman Busargin announced via Telegram. Engels Air Force Base, which is in that zone, was hit by a drone attack on Monday, the second such attack since December.