Russia airstrike, Ukraine: Seven reporter reveals close call with missile as it hit Kyiv TV tower

A Channel Seven correspondent reporting from Ukraine has told of the ‘terrifying’ moment he watched a Russian missile hit a TV tower in Kyiv.

Reporter Chris Reason said he was filming on a nearby deserted highway when the missile struck the city’s 400m-high television tower on Tuesday afternoon.

‘It was one of the most extraordinary and terrifying things I’ve ever seen,’ he told Sunrise on Wednesday morning.

‘We were doing some filming nearby on a six-lane deserted highway when we heard it and saw it scream through the air and seconds later hit its target.’ 

Smoke and flames rise up the side of Kyiv’s 400m TV tower after Russia bombed it on Tuesday. The tower remained standing but buildings around it were damaged, with some broadcasts knocked off air

Explosions erupted around the capital’s 1,300ft TV tower this afternoon, built near the ravine where nearly 34,000 Jews were killed in two days in 1941

Reason said he was filming on a nearby deserted highway when the missile struck the city’s 400m-high television tower

He said the missile appeared to strike the tower – which exploded into flames on impact – about 100m off the ground.

The airstrike was one of two large blasts seen the foot of the tower, with the other hitting the Babyn Yar holocaust memorial which sits on the site of one of the biggest single Jewish massacres during the Holocaust.

The memorial was built by a ravine where nearly 34,000 Jews were killed by SS troops in two days in 1941 during Adolf Hitler’s campaign against the Soviet Union. 

At least five people were killed in the latest onslaught, which came just hours after Russia told Ukrainian civilians to evacuate because it was about to begin bombarding ‘strategic’ targets. 

It was not immediately clear whether the tower had been the target of the strikes, or whether they had been targeting nearby buildings.

The tower remained standing, but buildings around it were damaged and several state broadcasts went off air. 

After the latest attack, Volodymyr Zelensky tweeted: ‘To the world: what is the point of saying “never again” for 80 years, if the world stays silent when a bomb drops on the same site of Babyn Yar? At least 5 killed. History repeating…’ 

Meanwhile the Ukrainian foreign ministry said: ‘Russian troops fired on the TV tower, near the Memorial complex #BabynYar. Russian criminals do not stop at anything in their barbarism. Russia = barbarian.’ 

Moscow’s ministry of defence on Tuesday said it would be launching strikes into the city targeting Ukraine’s security service and intelligence agencies with what it called ‘precision munitions’. 

Russia has been slammed as ‘barbaric’ for bombing the Babyn Yar holocaust memorial in Kyiv on the site of one of the biggest single massacres of Jews during the Holocaust (file image)

Pictured: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy takes part in a commemoration ceremony for the victims of Babyn Yar (Babiy Yar), one of the biggest single massacres of Jews during the Nazi Holocaust, in Kyiv Ukraine September 29, 2021

That raised fears that Kyiv was about to come under heavy bombardment after the cities of  Kharkiv, Mariupol and Kherson were hit by indiscriminate shelling earlier in the day.

A column of Russian artillery units and tanks 40 miles long has been pictured snaking its way towards Kyiv as analysts warned it will likely be tasked with surrounding the city, besieging it and bombing it into submission as Putin resorts to ‘medieval’ tactics in an attempt to force victory.

But the convoy has reportedly stalled as its forces face logistics challenges, including a shortage of food for some units, and Russians appear to be reevaluating how to move forward on the city, a senior U.S. defence official said on Tuesday.