As Ukraine reels from the latest round of Russian missile attacks, residents in the eastern city of Pokrovsk recalled the harrowing experience of a “double-tap” strike Monday that left at least nine people dead and 82 injured.
“I heard a hum. A very, very loud hum. Then the entire building shook and the windows on our balcony blew out. Half an hour later there was a second hit — it was even louder and even scarier,” Pokrovsk resident Liudmyla told CNN Tuesday.
After the first strike, military personnel warned them to take shelter for a possible second attack — but her husband was stood on the balcony, she said.
“I heard this growing rumble and I shouted for him to get out of there,” she said. “But he didn’t manage, he just fell to the floor and covered his head with hands. He was literally covered in glass.”
The explosion threw Liudmyla into another room. “You’re flying and you don’t realize where you are,” she said. “I just yelled to my husband to see if he was alive. He responded, I crawled to him and shattered the glass.”
She also had a message for the Russian forces laying siege to Ukraine.
“I’d like to say to the Russians: Value the lives. Both your own and ours. And enough of all this, enough. Enough,” Liudmyla said.
Another resident, Alla, whose home is also close to the area that was hit, said she and her husband went outside after the first explosion. When they returned to their apartment after the second explosion, “we saw there were no windows, no balcony, no electricity,” she said.
“Of course, we were very much scared,” she added. “We were terribly stressed, because it was very loud. We didn’t sleep the whole night. How can one sleep here, when there are no windows?”