Russia's round-the-clock drone attacks upend daily life in Kyiv

For much of the war, Russian drone and missile attacks on Kyiv followed a predictable pattern: they came at night. Residents would watch Telegram channels for warnings, gauge the threat, and decide whether to head for the metro or stay put. But that rhythm has been broken. Over the past week, Russia has switched to fast, jet-powered drones that strike at all hours, turning the city's daily life into a series of interruptions.

The constant air-raid sirens now punctuate commutes, shopping trips, and school days. In malls and banks, alerts force customers and staff to evacuate mid-task. A simple errand can become a cycle of entering, leaving, and re-entering a store. Volodymyr Bovsunovskyi described a recent family trip to buy clothes for his daughter that was cut short by an alert; they rushed out and saw smoke nearby, never completing the purchase.

Transport has also been hit. Train journeys stretch for hours as services halt for repeated alerts, sometimes forcing passengers to walk through fields. Even hailing a taxi has become absurd: GPS jamming meant to disrupt drones makes cars appear to move erratically, with arrival times stretching to thousands of minutes.

Yet life goes on. One Kyiv couple, Iryna Baranova and Evhen Mytsyk, went ahead with their wedding despite explosions sounding across the city on Wednesday morning. "If you wake up in the morning, you have to make the most of that day," Mytsyk said, "because there might not be another chance." In a nearby garden, Tetyana Shevchenko meditates to stay calm amid the sirens, finding it helps her cope with the stress of constant alerts and the bureaucracy she must navigate to recover state funds owed to her late mother.

For others, the strain is too much. Ivan Datsiv, whose apartment was damaged when a drone tore through his building, now jokes about repainting the walls. He no longer bothers with shelters, saying the alarms are so frequent that going down and coming back up is a waste of time. He is considering leaving the city for somewhere quieter. Bovsunovskyi, whose wife is pregnant, is also thinking of relocating temporarily. His daughter's kindergarten now moves children to shelters whenever an alert sounds, and he often picks her up early. "There is no stability," he said.