Odesa Families Face Relentless Shelling Amidst Ongoing Conflict

Sat Jan 17 2026 05:55:32 GMT+0200 (Eastern European Standard Time)

As the conflict in Ukraine escalates, families in Odesa struggle to cope with frequent drone attacks and power shortages, forcing them to adapt to a new and dangerous reality.

Families in Odesa are grappling with the reality of ongoing attacks from Russian drones, disrupting their lives and threatening their safety. Amid power cuts and economic strain, residents have learned to navigate the risks associated with daily life in a conflict zone. The city's strategic importance has made it a focal point of military operations, with escalating tensions affecting civilians profoundly, both physically and emotionally.

From Mariia's 16th-floor flat, the calm waters of the Black Sea stretch out into the horizon beneath the fading twilight.

"Up here you can see and hear when the drones come," she says, standing by a wall-length, floor-to-ceiling window. When they hit buildings and homes in the city of Odesa down below "we see all the fires too".

Her daughter Eva, who is nine, has learned the shapes and sounds of the objects that zoom through the sky on a daily basis. She proudly shows off a list of social media channels she checks when the air raid alerts go off.

"She knows whether what's coming is a risk or a threat, and that calms her down," her father Sergii says.

There is scarcely a place in Ukraine that has not been targeted since Russia launched its full-scale invasion nearly four years ago.

But in recent weeks Odesa – Ukraine's third largest city – has come under sustained attack. Through strikes on port and energy infrastructure, Russia is trying to cripple the region's economy and dent the population's morale.

Moscow, however, does not just hit facilities. Its drones, mostly as big as a motorcycle, regularly crash into high-rise buildings like Masha's, exploding on impact and blowing glass and debris inward. The consequences are often deadly.

As the strikes surge, air sirens go off frequently, but not everyone heeds them. Standing in front of a destroyed gym the morning after an overnight drone strike that injured seven people, Maryna Averina of the State Emergency Service concedes people have become "very careless about their own safety".

In December, almost a million people in Odesa were left with no power. "We were among the first regions to experience what it means to go through the winter period without electricity and without heating," says Oleh Kiper.

Oleh Kiper has made it a personal mission to sever any perceived remaining ties that Odesa has with Russia. He is a staunch supporter of a 2023 Law on Decolonisation, which directed local authorities to rid their cities of any street names, monuments or inscriptions that could be linked to Russia's imperial past.

The following day, as temperatures dropped to -6C, the city marked one month of partial blackouts, and air raid alerts were in force for four hours. The port of Chernomorsk, east of Odesa, was again hit by a ballistic missile, injuring a crew member on a civilian ship.