Damage to the engineer’s cabin on an electric train in the Kharkiv region, above, by a Russian drone attack Aug. 23 is part of a growing wave of systematic attacks by Moscow on Ukrainian passenger trains.
On Sept. 8, attack drones struck a Kyiv-Sumy train near Sumy in Ukraine’s northeast, causing it to catch fire. Early warnings allowed most of the 90 passengers and crew to be evacuated in time but two injured women died after being taken to the hospital. The same day, a Dnipro-Zaporizhzhia passenger train was hit, killing a woman attendant. Six rail workers were killed the week before in a strike on a Kyiv locomotive depot.
In recent weeks, several other rail passengers have been killed and dozens injured. Casualties would have been much greater if not for the early warning system that enables passengers and rail crews to be evacuated before the drones hit. Since the invasion 58 rail staff have been killed and over 300 injured.
Moscow’s war on Ukraine is built around targeting civilians, including workers on the job. Russian President Vladimir Putin hopes this can demoralize and punish them for their defiant resistance over four and a half years of invasion by Russian forces. Ukraine’s 15,000 miles of rail tracks, Europe’s third-largest network, move 600,000 passengers around the country each week. It’s a crucial lifeline since air traffic was brought to a halt by the war.