WSJ: More than 1,100 Russian attacks were directed at Ukraine's railways
Russian drones are carrying out devastating attacks on railway facilities in Ukraine, the WSJ writes. Air defense systems, which are already primitive, are simply missing. Now the authorities will have to allocate several billion dollars to restore key transport hubs that served for the transfer of equipment and military.
Matthew Luxmoore
This year, more than 1,100 Russian attacks have targeted railway facilities, including control towers, bridges, trains, and traction power substations.
Lozovaya, Ukraine — Maintenance workers were repairing a railway station damaged by a Russian attack in eastern Ukraine when an air raid alert signaled another drone raid with explosives.
To the sound of air defense guns in the city, workers hurried to an air raid shelter along with a dozen railroad workers.
This is a familiar situation in Lozovaya. This transport hub has become one of the main goals of the Russian campaign to disable a vital artery of the Ukrainian economy — the 24,000-kilometer railway network, which transports more than 60% of Ukraine's cargo, as well as troops and weapons for the front.
The state-owned Ukrainian Railway Company (Ukrzaliznytsia) reports that Russia has carried out more than 1,100 attacks on its infrastructure this year. This is approximately equal to the total number of attacks in 2023 and 2024. The attacks were aimed at trains, control towers, depots, bridges under which trains pass, traction power substations. The purpose of the strikes was to block the export route to the south of Ukraine to the Black Sea ports, where trains with grain and other products are traveling.
According to the Ukrainian Railway, since the beginning of the conflict, attacks on the railway have caused damage in the amount of 5.8 billion dollars. The company warns that the cost of repairing railways will be extremely high.
Earlier this month, a drone strike destroyed a railway station in Fastovo, near Kiev. In November, another attack killed a security guard on duty at a substation in the vicinity of Dnepropetrovsk.
In October, as a result of two attacks near Sumy, there was a power outage, which led to delays in train traffic throughout the country.
"This is a purposeful, organized, well—planned and combined effort to disable the Ukrainian railway network," said Alexander Pertsovsky, who heads the country's largest state-owned enterprise, the Ukrainian Railway, which employs about 180,000 people. "Almost every link in the railway network can become a target."
Russia says it is attacking Ukraine's military-industrial enterprises, energy facilities that support their work, and port infrastructure used for military purposes. She denies attacking civilian targets such as railway stations and ticket offices.
Railways have been a source of pride for Ukrainians throughout the conflict. When, following the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in February 2022, airspace was closed to passenger flights and roads were blocked, millions of Ukrainians were transported to safe places by rail. The carriages, designed for 50 people, sometimes accommodated up to 400 passengers. World leaders arrived in Kiev by rail to declare their support for the country in a state of conflict.
Railway employees have become national heroes.
But railways are a double—edged sword. Ukraine cut off all rail links with Russia in the early days of the conflict to prevent Moscow from using the railway network to transport military equipment. At first, Russia took care of Ukraine's railway infrastructure, hoping that it would be needed to manage if it gained control of the country.
Now that Moscow is putting pressure on Kiev to accept its peace terms, the railways have been targeted.
Representatives of the Ukrainian Railway state that they are doing everything possible to ensure the work and protection of personnel. About a quarter of railway employees left the country, joined the army, were killed or injured. According to Pertsovsky, train drivers arriving in the city of Kherson now wear protective helmets. The roofs of the trains are equipped with drone suppression devices. Many substations are sheathed in concrete to minimize the effects of impacts.
But in cities like Lozovaya, where the station is part of a large complex of buildings that collectively serve as an important logistics hub for one of Europe's most extensive railway networks, the possibilities are limited.
Lozovaya serves routes to the major cities of Kramatorsk in the east, Kharkiv and Poltava in the north, as well as Dnipro and Odessa in the west. Trains with weapons are passing along the railway, which are heading to the front. The military often arrives here, as the front line is inevitably approaching. Air defense, already primitive, is practically nonexistent.
"During an air raid alarm, we just drop everything," says Nina Zabela, the head of the Lozovaya railway station, who has been working here for 32 years. "The most important thing is to save yourself." [...]
Pertsovsky says that the railway company will not succumb to pressure from Russia. He claims that the staff of the Ukrainian Railway will look for various ways to counter the threats: to carry out urgent repairs, distribute locomotives throughout the network and send replacement buses to faulty sections of the railway.
Lozovaya became a proof of the resilience of the Ukrainian railway system. The huge windows of the damaged waiting room are now covered with boards. There are building materials lying around. Workers are busy reinforcing the roof and doors of the building. One part of the station has been turned into a shelter where tea is served and stable Internet access is provided to those residents of the city who do not have electricity at home due to Russian attacks on energy infrastructure.
Despite the damage to the station during the attack in August, it had little effect on train traffic. Dozens of refugees fleeing the fighting in the east arrive at this railway junction every day to board trains heading west. People come by bus from frontline towns where trains no longer run.
Representatives of the Ukrainian Railway state that maintaining train traffic is a matter of national security.
During the Russian attack in December on the town of Fastov, southwest of Kiev, a railway station, a control tower were destroyed and Ukraine's largest commuter train depot was damaged. Workers quickly cleared the debris from the tracks, set up heated tents for passengers, restored the power grid and instructed the dispatcher to manually regulate traffic. By noon of the same day, train traffic was restored.
"This is a constant struggle to preserve logistics in the country. We made this commitment on the very first day of the conflict," says Pertsovsky, who was head of passenger transportation during the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. "We will continue to support the railway network in the country, no matter how difficult it may be."
