After two nights of jubilation following the liberation of their city, the people of Kherson began on Sunday to assess the extent of the damage caused by eight long months of Russian occupation, with residents still without electricity and water.
On Sunday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Russian forces had destroyed key infrastructure before withdrawing, while the mayor of Kherson said the humanitarian situation was “serious” due to a lack of medicine and bread.
The departing Russian troops also left behind thousands of mines, manned cables and unexploded shells.
Roman Golovnya, adviser to the city’s local administration, said: “The occupation forces and Russian collaborators did everything possible to make those people who remained in the city suffer as much as possible during these days, weeks and months of waiting.”
The retreating Russians comprehensively destroyed all critical infrastructure, including communications, electricity, water, heat, a 100-meter-tall television tower, and at least four bridges.
Ukrainian authorities are trying to assess damage to the Nova Kakhovka Dam on the Dnipro River, about 40 miles to the northeast, which the Russians tried to blow up during their retreat. Satellite images show signs of destruction “with sections of the dam and floodgates destroyed”. However, it is not clear whether the structural integrity of the reservoir is at risk. With a water volume of 18.2 cubic km, if the Kakhovka reservoir was destroyed it could flood a large area, including the city of Kherson.
The Nova Kakhovka Dam was damaged after the Russian retreat south of the Dnipro River
People have testified that Russian troops carried out rampant looting in the city, stealing private cars, washing machines, microwaves, women’s clothing and other household items. They removed 15,000 exhibits from the Kherson art museum and stole the bones of Grigory Potemkin, Catherine the Great’s friend and lover, from a crypt in the city’s cathedral.
On Sunday it was seen that they had also taken most of the animals from the Kherson zoo. Llamas, wolves, donkeys, raccoons and squirrels were sent to the Crimea. “The raccoon from the zoo was not stolen by a stupid soldier, but by the Russian command,” said Oleksandr Todorchuk, the head of UAnimals, which rescues animals in war.
Ukrainians accused the Russians of blowing up dozens of schools across the province, further damaging the prospects of children who have already missed nine months of school. In the occupied village of Mala Oleksandrivka, Russian soldiers turned the local school into a military base and parked their tanks next to the sports field. In Mylove, who was released on Thursday, they blew up the main school and kindergarten while driving in armored vehicles. About 300 people stayed in the town during the occupation, including teenagers and children of primary school age. They waved at visiting cars and smiled.
“Our children have had no education since February 24,” said Serhii Melnikov, a local resident. With little or no internet, students had found it difficult to access online education, he said, adding that the village was without electricity, water and gas, a typical situation in rural Kherson.
Utility companies said Sunday they were working to restore connections. They said it would be at least a month before electricity could be restored to the city of Kherson. In some of the northern communities in the region closest to the old front line, power could be restored next week, they said.
However, Iryna, a resident of the city of Kherson, said on a Telegram channel that hope that power and water would be restored soon remained remote. “The boys are already doing a lot, but we have to face reality,” he added. “Electricity today, tomorrow and even the day after tomorrow will not appear … everything will be later, we just have to be patient and wait.”
Yulianna, another resident of Kherson, said: “The war is still going on in the country and in our city. We have been waiting for eight months, we can wait for more weeks. The most important thing is that the city has been liberated.”
As has already happened in other Ukrainian regions occupied by the Russians at the beginning of their invasion, the first move of the Moscow troops was to destroy the telecommunications towers. For almost eight months, the people of Kherson have been cut off from the world, time and space. The lack of telephone networks has meant that there is no more contact with the outside world. On Saturday, a Wi-Fi hotspot was set up next to the main bus station using a satellite dish, and passers-by were able to log in.
A damaged building in Kherson after the Russian retreat. Photo: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
Some have already started collecting wood to prepare for a cold and bleak winter.
According to US officials, the Kremlin’s decision to withdraw from Kherson was based, in part, on concerns that its soldiers would “be cut off from supplies come winter.”
Additional security measures were in place as military police checked the documents of the local population and hunted down Russian soldiers and saboteurs who might have been disguised as civilians. Regional governor Yaroslav Yanushevych said authorities would maintain a curfew from 5pm to 8am and ban people from entering or leaving the city.
“The enemy mined all critical infrastructure objects. We are trying to regroup in a few days and [then] open the city,” he told Ukrainian television, adding that mobile phone operations could start working on Sunday.
Landmines left by Russian forces are becoming one of Ukraine’s biggest challenges, especially as it scrambles to clear and restore the ruins. According to Kyiv, more than 2,000 explosive items ranging from booby traps to mines have already been removed.
In the Kharkiv region, two road workers were killed and four injured by a mine while trying to pave the road in a formerly occupied area.
In his latest video address on Sunday, Zelenskiy said the Ukrainian military’s spectacular counteroffensive would continue.
“We will definitely reach our state border – all sections of Ukraine’s internationally recognized border,” Zelesnkiy said. He promised the evacuation of the southern cities of Henichesk, named by Russia as its new administrative “capital” for the Kherson region, and Melitopol.
His statement suggests that Crimea, illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014, is an active Ukrainian military target.