Following a “massive” attack on Ukraine’s power grid, Ukrainian officials have issued air raid alerts nationwide due to fatal Russian bombings. Ukrainian air force reported “takeoff of several Tu-95MS from the Engels airfield” in western Russia early Tuesday.

Two additional persons were murdered overnight and five injured in a strike that targeted a hotel in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, according to emergency services, while another two were killed and four injured in drone attacks on the city of Zaporizhzhia, east of Kryvyi Rih.

Kyiv region’s air defence systems were deployed numerous times overnight to deflect missiles and drones targeting the Ukrainian capital, the region’s military administration announced on Telegram. Reuters witnesses reported at least three rounds of blasts overnight in Kyiv.

Kryvyi Rih, Kyiv and central and eastern parts of Ukraine were under air raid alerts for most of the night, commencing at around 11pm on Monday.

Two individuals may be still under the wreckage of the hotel in Kryvyi Rih, Serhiy Lisak, the governor of the Dnipropetrovsk area where Kryvyi Rih is located, said on Telegram. Six shops, four high-rise buildings and eight cars were also destroyed there, he added.

Analysts at the Washington-based thinktank Institute for the Study of War, said in their report late on Monday that Moscow “likely lacks the defence-industrial capacity to sustain such massive strikes at a similar scale with regularity.”

On Monday, Russia fired hundreds of drones and missiles at Ukraine, killing at least seven people and hammering the country’s already vulnerable energy sector, officials said.

The Russian attack produced extensive blackouts and water disruptions including in Kyiv and came after Ukraine claimed new advances in its incursion in Russia’s Kursk area.

On Monday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Moscow had launched at least 127 missiles and 109 drones in “one of the largest Russian attacks”.

Of those, 102 missiles and 99 drones were shot down, according to Ukrainian air force chief Mykola Oleshchuk, who described it as Russia’s “most massive” attack.

The US and Britain immediately condemned the assault, with US president Joe Biden calling it “outrageous” and British foreign minister David Lammy calling it “cowardly”.

Germany’s foreign ministry claimed that “once again, Putin’s Russia is saturating Ukraine’s lifelines with missiles”.

State-owned electrical company Ukrenergo announced emergency power cuts to stabilise the system after the barrage, while train schedules were delayed.

Since invading in February 2022, Russia has unleashed repeated large-scale drone and missile attacks on Ukraine, including severe strikes on energy facilities.

The Russian defense ministry said it had attacked energy facilities in a statement on Monday, alleging that they were being used to aid Ukraine’s “military-production complex”.

Nato member Poland reported its airspace was violated during the barrage, probably by a drone. “We are probably dealing with the entry of an object on Polish territory. The item was confirmed by at least three radiolocation stations,” Gen Maciej Klisz, operational commander of the armed forces, told reporters.

Zelenskiy called on European air forces to help Kyiv drop drones and missiles in the future. “In our various regions of Ukraine, we could do much more to protect lives if the aviation of our European neighbours worked together with our F-16s and together with our air defence,” Zelenskiy stated in an address.

Monday’s aerial barrage began after a safety adviser working for the Reuters news agency, Ryan Evans, was killed in a missile strike on a hotel in eastern Ukraine late on Saturday. Six of the agency’s staff covering the fighting were staying at the hotel in Kramatorsk, the last major city under Ukrainian control in the Donetsk region.

Ivan Lyubysh-Kirdey, a journalist, was in critical condition after the walkout, Reuters said on Monday. A second, Daniel Peleschuk, was hurt while the other three team members have been accounted for, according to the agency.

The Kremlin said there was “still no clarity” about the incident when asked about Zelensky’s assertion that the attack was carried out “deliberately”.