WarSeptember 2, 2026 11:14 pm (Updated: September 3, 2026 7:41 am) • 3 min readRussia attacked southern port city of Odesa overnight on Sept. 3. (National Police) Kyiv was hit by a Russian drone attack for the seventh night in a row late in the evening on Sept. 2. Explosions were heard in the capital shortly before 11 p.m. local time, according to Kyiv Independent reporters on the ground. The sound of the blast suggested a target had been hit. Minutes later, journalists reported another round of explosions. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said that air defense units were actively repelling Russian drones targeting the capital. He urged residents to stay in shelters. Air raid alerts also sounded in cities far from the front line, including Ternopil in western Ukraine, as the Air Force warned of inbound Russian drones. Another round of explosions came at around 12:38 a.m. local time, Kyiv Independent journalists on the ground reported. The blasts followed a series of warnings from the Air Force that Russian jet-powered UAVs were heading toward the city. Odesa Oblast Governor Oleh Kiper reported at 7 a.m. local time that at least 17 people, including three children, were injured in the latest Russian attack on the region.The attack damaged 20 apartments between the 10th and 17th floors of a high-rise residential building, as well as 12 cars parked nearby.A high-rise residential building damaged in Russia’s latest attack on Odesa overnight on Sept. 3. (Odesa Oblast Military Administration/ Telegram)Emergency services are working at the scene, and an operational headquarters has been set up, Kiper said.The latest drone barrage follows a week of relentless Russian attacks against Kyiv — including daytime strikes, nonstop air raid sirens, ballistic missile attacks, and devastating civilian casualties. The onslaught prompted President Volodymyr Zelensky to announce a change in Ukraine's aerial alert system. Under the new plan, alerts will be divided into red and yellow levels, with yellow corresponding to drone threats and red signaling incoming missiles and massive combined attacks. Moscow's assault on Kyiv comes as Ukraine suffers a severe shortage of air defense systems, leaving cities with little protection against ballistic missiles and jet-powered drones. Even as Ukraine expands its own long-range strike capabilities to hit back at Russia, the air defense crisis has made summer 2026 the deadliest time for civilians since the first months of the full-scale invasion.