Ukraine braces for lengthy winter blackouts as Russia changes air strike tactics

Sources in the industry said that Ukrainians should prepare for prolonged power outages.

“This winter there will definitely be an electricity shortage,” an unnamed employee of a state energy company said.

“Emergency outages are already in effect across nearly the entire country. Most likely, we will face a ‘4-by-2’ scenario: four hours without power, two hours with.”

Chernihiv and Sumy oblasts are expected to be hardest hit, with Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Odesa, and Kherson also at high risk.

Officials say Russia has moved away from country-wide missile and drone strikes in a single wave. Instead, it is conducting “phased slicing” attacks—targeting transmission networks region by region—and launching only a few drones every hour. After these drone attacks, they follow up with ballistic missiles aimed at local power plants. The goal, analysts say, is to unbalance Ukraine’s power grid and trigger a cascading blackout.

Since Oct. 9, much of Ukraine has been dealing with frequent emergency blackouts as power grid operator Ukrenergo copes with sustained enemy attacks on energy infrastructure.