KYIV — Russia launched a large-scale drone assault on Ukraine overnight from Saturday into Sunday, deploying 165 unmanned aerial vehicles, according to Ukraine’s armed forces.

In the capital Kyiv, the attacks triggered fires that left eleven people injured, including two children, according to the State Emergency Services (SES).

The SES reported that the attack affected three districts of the capital: Obolonskyi, Sviatoshynskyi, and Shevchenkivskyi.

In Obolonskyi, a blaze damaged a 12-story residential building.

"When it hit, we didn’t know what to do. I was with my son, and I said to him: ‘Come on, let’s go!’ I grabbed him like this, in my pajamas, and ran over here. We saw a neighbor come out and start running away," Nadiya, one of its residents, said.

“We saw people coming down the stairs to evacuate. We were all sitting here in the dark," she added.

"There was a strong fire, they were putting it out, and we were sitting here. Two guys got hurt, an ambulance came, but they didn’t take them, probably they were under a lot of stress."

Meanwhile, in Sviatoshynskyi, residential buildings were affected by fire, and in Shevchenkivskyi, local infrastructure bore the brunt of the attack, with roads and electricity poles damaged.

The SES said that 75 firefighters were deployed to tackle the blazes, all of which have now been extinguished.

Further south, the central region of Cherkasy also sustained damage following Russian shelling.

In the town of Cherkasy, the facades and windows of multi-story buildings were destroyed, along with warehouses belonging to a furniture company, a trading base and garden structures.

"There was no whistle, no noise, nothing, it just hit us so hard that the windows blew out. Thank God we are alive," one resident, Vasyl Shevchenko, recounted the attack.

"They say that you need to take packages, take documents, take this and that. In such a situation, what can you take? We just took our underwear and ran."

Preliminary reports indicate that 10 flats were damaged during the overnight strikes, two of which were completely destroyed by fire.

Emergency services mobilized more than 100 rescuers and 26 vehicles to respond to the affected areas, where both homes and businesses were impacted by the fires.

According to the Air Armed Forces of Ukraine’s Telegram channel, the regions of Kharkiv, Donetsk, and Dnipropetrovsk were also targeted during the overnight strikes.

Ukraine’s military says it shot down 69 Shahed-type drones and other UAVs, while 80 went off radar.

Meanwhile, Russia’s Defense Ministry released footage on Sunday, claiming it showed Russian forces striking Ukrainian military positions in the southern Kherson region. Euronews could not independently verify its authenticity. — Euronews