Over the course of a day, Russian forces launched a series of strikes on facilities of the major Ukrainian retail chain Epicenter across four regions of the country. As a result of drone and missile attacks, destruction and fires were recorded at shopping centers as well as related civilian infrastructure. The owning company described the incident as a large-scale attack on the network's infrastructure.
Attacks on Shopping Centers in Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Vinnytsia, and Poltava
According to the company and regional authorities, facilities of the retail chain were targeted simultaneously in several Ukrainian cities. On October 25, drones attacked a shopping center and a civilian enterprise in Kharkiv, causing massive fires and injuring four people, including three SES employees. Concurrently, a strike on a commercial facility in Zaporizhzhia in the morning of the same day caused a fire, as reported by Ivan Fedorov, co-chair of the Zaporizhzhia Oblast Defense Council.
Consequences of Night and Morning Raids in the Regions
Vinnytsia and its surrounding region also experienced a night drone raid, damaging a civilian industrial facility and a private residential building. In the morning, a similar strike hit the Epicenter shopping complex in Poltava, where a severe fire broke out following the drone impact. According to preliminary medical reports, a 52-year-old woman was injured in the Poltava incident.
Company Management Response and Extent of Destruction
Representatives of the Epicenter chain characterized the events of the past 24 hours as a targeted destruction of the company's retail infrastructure facilities. The exact damage from the series of strikes across the four cities remains to be assessed once rescue services and sappers complete their work. Experts note that such attacks on large shopping centers deal a heavy blow to the logistics of supplying the population with essential goods and significantly increase the burden on emergency services in the regions.
