A Ukrainian firefighter rushed to the scene of a Russian drone attack. He found his wife, daughter and grandson dead

By Ivana Kottasová and Kostya Gak, CNN

(CNN) — When the chief of the local fire department was called to a scene of a Russian strike in the central Ukrainian city of Pryluky overnight, he and his brigade found five people were killed and nine injured after a drone hit a residential building.

Among the dead: the firefighter’s wife, his daughter and his baby grandson.

“Three generations… there are no words that can ease this pain,” the Ukrainian National Police said in a statement on Thursday announcing the death of Daryna Shygyda, the firefighter’s daughter, who was a serving police officer.

“She was strong, bright and sincere. She was loyal to her oath, fair and had a deep sense of duty – this is how her colleagues and everyone who knew her will remember her,” the police said in a statement, adding that Shygyda joined the force in 2020, when she was 22 years old.

“Becoming a police officer was her dream and vocation. Her firefighter dad taught her to help people since she was a child. And her husband, who is also a patrol officer, always supported and helped in the service,” the police statement said.

Her son was just one year old. His name was not released, and a photo of the baby shared on social media shows him facing away from the camera, held tightly by his mother and wrapped in a jacket with a wooly winter hat.

According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the boy was the 632nd child killed by Russia since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Zelensky said on Thursday that Russia launched 103 drones and one ballistic missile against the country overnight, targeting multiple regions. At least eight people were killed in the attacks.

Speaking about the Shahed drone attack on Pryluky that killed the firefighter’s family, Zelensky called on Ukraine’s western allies to put extra pressure on Moscow.

“This is yet another massive strike by terrorists – Russian terrorists who kill our people every night,” Zelensky said on Telegram.

“This is yet another reason to impose maximum sanctions and exert pressure together. Strength matters, and only strength can end this war,” he said, adding that Kyiv “expect action from the US, Europe and everyone in the world who can truly help change these terrible circumstances.”

As the Kremlin continues to speak about peace – most recently on Wednesday, when the Russian President Vladimir Putin told Pope Leo XIV that he had “interest in achieving peace” – it continues to terrorize Ukrainian civilians with daily aerial attacks.

A tally compiled by CNN shows that as of Thursday morning, at least 30 Ukrainian civilians have been killed and more than 150 injured in Russian strikes this week alone, including eight in just the past 24 hours.

The attack also comes soon after another phone call between Putin and US President Donald Trump, in which the Russian leader said he would respond to Kyiv’s audacious drone attack on Russia’s air force.

Russia stepped up its airborne attacks against Ukraine in the past few months after it successfully managed to scale up domestic production of its own version of the Iranian-made Shahed drones, the type used most frequently in these attacks.

Analysts say the brutal campaign is part of a deliberate strategy by Russia that is designed to create an impression that it has the upper hand in the conflict and undermine Ukraine’s morale.

The town of Pryluky, where the firefighter’s family and two other people were killed overnight, declared two days of mourning on Thursday and Friday, ordering flags to be flown half-mast and black banners displayed on public buildings.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.