Drone strike on a park in Nova Vodolaha: six killed, including two children

What happened

On Monday, 19 October, at around 16:30 the Russian army struck the central park of the town of Nova Vodolaha in Kharkiv region with a drone. According to the Kharkiv regional prosecutor’s office, it was preliminarily a Geran-3 attack drone. It hit an open area next to a café at a time when the park was full of people, including mothers with children.

Interior Minister Ivan Vyhivskyi first reported that two women and a baby in a pram had been killed and at least 14 people injured. Later the head of the Kharkiv regional military administration, Oleh Syniehubov, said the death toll had risen to six.

Who was killed

According to prosecutors and police, three women aged 28, 34 and 36 were killed, as well as two girls born in 2015 and 2025. Suspilne later reported, citing Syniehubov, that a 40-year-old man had also died. Six people were therefore killed: four adults and two children. Early reports of three children among the dead were not confirmed.

President Volodymyr Zelensky named the youngest victim: one-year-old Anhelina, born in August 2025, was killed in her pram. Her mother, Inna, died in hospital. The other girl who was killed was 11 years old.

Fifteen people were injured, seven of them children. Viktor Zabashta, director of the regional emergency medical centre, told Suspilne that nine adults and six children had shrapnel wounds. Intensive-care teams took the injured to hospitals in Kharkiv.

“The strike was aimed at people”

Local police chief Yurii Yurchenko told Suspilne that the drone circled the park several times before it clipped a tree near the café and fell onto a footpath. He said the weather was good, the fountain was running and people had come out to walk with their children and ride bicycles.

A café, a shop, a children’s art school, an apartment block, a private house and a car were damaged. Prosecutors opened a war crimes case (Article 438(2) of the Criminal Code). The head of the community, Oleksandr Yesin, declared Tuesday, 20 October, a day of mourning in the Nova Vodolaha community.

Zelensky’s reaction

“A Shahed hit practically straight at people — at a park near an ordinary café. Absolute atrocity,” Zelensky wrote. He urged partners not to lift sanctions on Russia “until the killing stops”, asked America to “be strong” and apply Senator Lindsey Graham’s law, and asked Europe to keep up its support. Ukraine needs air defence, the president stressed, adding: “The world has enough strength to stop the war.”

Context

The strike came on a day of another massive Russian attack on Ukrainian cities and energy facilities. According to Syniehubov, 17 settlements in Kharkiv region and the city of Kharkiv were shelled within a single day and more than 10 people were injured. Nova Vodolaha lies south-west of Kharkiv, deeper inside the region rather than on the front line.

What to keep in mind

• do not ignore air-raid alerts even in communities far from the front, and take cover as soon as you hear a drone;
• do not post photos or videos of impact sites or air-defence activity on social media;
• rely only on official sources — regional administrations, the State Emergency Service and the police — for updates and help for victims.