In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Emergency Service, emergency services personnel work to extinguish a fire following a Russian attack in Lviv, Ukraine, on September 19, 2023.
| Photo Credit: AP
“Russia struck three industrial warehouses in a drone strike on the western Ukrainian city of Lviv early on September 19, causing a huge fire and killing at least one person,” local officials said.
Lviv governor Maxim Kozitsky said firefighters were tackling the blaze and that a 26-year-old man had been taken to hospital. City mayor Andriy Sadovyi later said the body of a man who worked at one of the warehouses had been found under the rubble.
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Emergency services said the fire had spread over an area of 9,450 square metres (11,300 square yards) after an attack at around 5 a.m. (0200 GMT).
“I want to emphasise that these are ordinary industrial warehouses. Nothing military was stored there,” Mr. Kozitsky said on the Telegram messaging app.
He said Russian forces had launched 18 drones in the attack and that 15 had been shot down, including seven that were directly over the Lviv region.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia had launched a total of 30 drones and one Iskander ballistic missile in attacks on Ukraine overnight and that 27 of the drones had been shot down.
Reuters could not independently verify the report. There was no immediate comment from Moscow, which has carried out frequent air strikes on Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Russia has repeatedly attacked infrastructure critical to Ukraine’s defence, energy system and agriculture but many civilians have also been killed.
At least seven people were killed in July when a Russian missile slammed into a residential building in Lviv, which is far from front lines. Moscow has denied deliberately targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure.