Lumiere_du_Code
Jedi Council Member
I would like to talk a bit about the situation around Energodar. Since I live right next to the nuclear power plant on the opposite coast.
I made notes on the map:
- blue areas: exact locations from where artillery, MLRS, 120 mm mortars and drones of Ukrainian "people's defenders" are firing;
- green areas: places from where probably also strikes are launched (I know this only from retellings, I cannot say for sure, but I am more than sure that this is true, as these are very close and convenient points for firing from them);
- orange circle: I am there;
- red circle: Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant (its 2 smokestacks and all 6 power units are visible from my city from high point/upper floors, if the view is not blocked).
The average distance from the center of my city to the nuclear power plant is about 15 km. Half that from coast to coast.
Ukraine's shelling of Energodar and the nuclear power plant began around mid-July (around the 12th/13th) and continued until yesterday evening (September 1). Today, as of this writing, it is still quiet. Ukrainian forces were striking alone for the first few days, and there were no retaliatory strikes (at least, I have not heard anything about that). Then the artillery duels began, which lasted more than 1.5 months. Which makes me really wonder why Russia didn't suppress this by destroying the firing positions of the Ukrainian troops at that point and generally preemptively. Since they create VERY many problems and real threats, including strikes on residential neighborhoods.
At first, Russian troops returned fire only at night and only from multiple rocket launchers, which cover squares, there rather poor accuracy. As a result, many residential buildings, kindergartens, and other civilian infrastructure were damaged and destroyed, because the "defenders" were hiding behind the backs of civilians. It's the same in my city. Nikopol and Chervonogrigorovka suffer the most, as that is where most of the blows to the Energodar zone come from. Then there is my city, and artillery (including American M777 howitzers, as the reports of the Russian Ministry of Defense claim) also stands within its boundaries and on its outskirts. I can hear them firing very well here, just a few kilometers from my house. My town is small, and I'm practically in the middle of it, and the distance to most of the outermost points of the city is about the same. These are loud shots from howitzers and mortars.
A couple of weeks from the start of the shelling in June, the Russian troops, in addition to MLRS, began retaliating with howitzers as well. And all these "incoming" shots could be heard very well here, too, even through the closed windows and shutters I had to make on the windows in the house to at least somehow protect my relatives from the likely scattering of shrapnel and broken glass.
How it happened: the Ukrainians fired throughout the day in a series of shots, sometimes artillery fire for up to two hours in a row, then a short pause, and then they kept firing again, and so on all day long, until nightfall. Then the Russian counterattacks began, several times during the night. And this went on for a little over a month.
But for the last 2-3 weeks the Russian side also has been firing at any time of the day or night.
There are local chats in the social network of telegrams, where "patriots of Ukraine" (read Nazis and haters of everything Russian, including their own citizens with ANY other opinion) represented by Yevtushenko, head of the Nikopol district military administration (and my city is part of this district) publish photos after Russian retaliatory strikes, but only extremely avoidably: not a single mention or photo of military casualties/military equipment, just the same mantras "the bloody aggressor is once again destroying a peaceful city and fighting the residents' homes and stores" and all that. Houses and other buildings are indeed destroyed, damaged, some residents are indeed killed in their beds and injured. "Thanks" to the Ukrainian "defenders" for that.
However, a few weeks ago, in fact, there was a nighttime strike from Energodar from the 'Grad' MLRS right in the center of my city, where the Palace of Culture, bank, many stores, stadium, several cafes, clinic, school, etc. are located. The building that received the main hit was a bank and the office of a private security organization that has been operating in my city for more than 11 years (their main office is in another region). They wore gray camouflage uniforms and were armed only with truncheons and traumatic pistols. In that building is their control room and their living quarters. And that's where the night strike took place. Ten people died on the spot, two more later died in the hospital, and several more were wounded. Some of them I knew personally.
But the actual location of the military was in a nearby building, and the military was not harmed at all. Neither were the tent-covered vehicles standing under windows, as people said.
I do not know who passes the data to the Russian side for targets, or how they choose them themselves, but that strike was definitely in the wrong place. Unfortunately, uninvolved people always suffer from hostilities, on both sides.
I made notes on the map:
- blue areas: exact locations from where artillery, MLRS, 120 mm mortars and drones of Ukrainian "people's defenders" are firing;
- green areas: places from where probably also strikes are launched (I know this only from retellings, I cannot say for sure, but I am more than sure that this is true, as these are very close and convenient points for firing from them);
- orange circle: I am there;
- red circle: Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant (its 2 smokestacks and all 6 power units are visible from my city from high point/upper floors, if the view is not blocked).
The average distance from the center of my city to the nuclear power plant is about 15 km. Half that from coast to coast.
Ukraine's shelling of Energodar and the nuclear power plant began around mid-July (around the 12th/13th) and continued until yesterday evening (September 1). Today, as of this writing, it is still quiet. Ukrainian forces were striking alone for the first few days, and there were no retaliatory strikes (at least, I have not heard anything about that). Then the artillery duels began, which lasted more than 1.5 months. Which makes me really wonder why Russia didn't suppress this by destroying the firing positions of the Ukrainian troops at that point and generally preemptively. Since they create VERY many problems and real threats, including strikes on residential neighborhoods.
At first, Russian troops returned fire only at night and only from multiple rocket launchers, which cover squares, there rather poor accuracy. As a result, many residential buildings, kindergartens, and other civilian infrastructure were damaged and destroyed, because the "defenders" were hiding behind the backs of civilians. It's the same in my city. Nikopol and Chervonogrigorovka suffer the most, as that is where most of the blows to the Energodar zone come from. Then there is my city, and artillery (including American M777 howitzers, as the reports of the Russian Ministry of Defense claim) also stands within its boundaries and on its outskirts. I can hear them firing very well here, just a few kilometers from my house. My town is small, and I'm practically in the middle of it, and the distance to most of the outermost points of the city is about the same. These are loud shots from howitzers and mortars.
A couple of weeks from the start of the shelling in June, the Russian troops, in addition to MLRS, began retaliating with howitzers as well. And all these "incoming" shots could be heard very well here, too, even through the closed windows and shutters I had to make on the windows in the house to at least somehow protect my relatives from the likely scattering of shrapnel and broken glass.
How it happened: the Ukrainians fired throughout the day in a series of shots, sometimes artillery fire for up to two hours in a row, then a short pause, and then they kept firing again, and so on all day long, until nightfall. Then the Russian counterattacks began, several times during the night. And this went on for a little over a month.
But for the last 2-3 weeks the Russian side also has been firing at any time of the day or night.
There are local chats in the social network of telegrams, where "patriots of Ukraine" (read Nazis and haters of everything Russian, including their own citizens with ANY other opinion) represented by Yevtushenko, head of the Nikopol district military administration (and my city is part of this district) publish photos after Russian retaliatory strikes, but only extremely avoidably: not a single mention or photo of military casualties/military equipment, just the same mantras "the bloody aggressor is once again destroying a peaceful city and fighting the residents' homes and stores" and all that. Houses and other buildings are indeed destroyed, damaged, some residents are indeed killed in their beds and injured. "Thanks" to the Ukrainian "defenders" for that.
However, a few weeks ago, in fact, there was a nighttime strike from Energodar from the 'Grad' MLRS right in the center of my city, where the Palace of Culture, bank, many stores, stadium, several cafes, clinic, school, etc. are located. The building that received the main hit was a bank and the office of a private security organization that has been operating in my city for more than 11 years (their main office is in another region). They wore gray camouflage uniforms and were armed only with truncheons and traumatic pistols. In that building is their control room and their living quarters. And that's where the night strike took place. Ten people died on the spot, two more later died in the hospital, and several more were wounded. Some of them I knew personally.
But the actual location of the military was in a nearby building, and the military was not harmed at all. Neither were the tent-covered vehicles standing under windows, as people said.
I do not know who passes the data to the Russian side for targets, or how they choose them themselves, but that strike was definitely in the wrong place. Unfortunately, uninvolved people always suffer from hostilities, on both sides.