‘The Winds Were Like Nothing I’ve Heard Before’ – Ukraine at War Update for Oct. 10

The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) announced on Thursday that they had struck a weapons depot in southern Russia, detonating some 400 Iranian-made Shahed attack drones. According to Forbes, that’s nearly five percent of all of the 440-pound drones that Moscow has deployed so far in its 31-month full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

“An accurate hit on the target was recorded,” the General Staff of the AFU noted. “A secondary detonation was observed.”

The American business journal wrote that “the propeller-driven, satellite-guided Shahed—developed by Shahed Aviation Industries in Iran—is one of Russia’s main weapons for deep strikes on Ukrainian cities. Since acquiring the first Shaheds from Iran in 2022, Russia has launched more than 8,000 of the explosive drones,” the journal claimed, quoting Reuters’ figures.

The AFU has had famous success with its own UAVs, with international war pundits claiming that Ukraine has “changed the face of war” with its use of drones.

On Wednesday, at least 20 Ukrainian drones targeted the 67th Arsenal of the Russian Army’s Main Rocket Artillery Directorate (GRAU), a major munitions storage site for Moscow’s forces operating in northern Ukraine and in Russia’s Kursk region – which Ukrainian troops invaded in August.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin has claimed that all 24 Ukrainian unmanned aircraft observed above Russia’s western Bryansk region were shot down in the early hours of Wednesday and reported no damage.

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Russia, Ukraine Exchange Over 300 POWs Ahead of New Year’s Eve

Moscow and Kyiv swapped 150 Ukrainian soldiers held captive for an equal number of Russian troops on Monday in an exchange deal brokered by the United Arab Emirates.

Hurricane Milton rips apart Florida’s Gulf Coast, with damage perhaps worse than expected

The second major hurricane to hit the US state of Florida in two weeks hit near the city of Sarasota on Wednesday night. It made landfall with winds registering at about 120 mph and brought record-breaking storm surges.

The unprecedented series of hurricanes has kept US President Joe Biden from making a scheduled trip to Germany to discuss the war in Ukraine with other NATO leaders and has outlasted the budget of the nation’s federal emergency services, causing a social uproar.

Just before the storm hit, Biden said that Hurricane Milton could be the worst the nation has seen in 100 years. And eyewitness accounts as it unfolded, two hours into landfall, are playing out those fears.

“It’s like nothing I have ever heard before,” said Florida resident (and family member of a Kyiv Post correspondent) Lauren Smith, when reached by phone at 8:50 p.m. local time on Wednesday, shortly after she heard a transformer explode and then lost power in the house, and her 10-foot-tall (3.0 meter high) yard fences were blown away.

As a hospice nurse at a St Petersburg, FL, hospital, Smith was not allowed to evacuate, nor were the state’s other essential personnel, and had to witness the devastation from her living room window. Raised in Kansas City, Missouri, Smith said she has been through many tornadoes in the US Midwest, a volcanic eruption in Costa Rica, earthquakes on the US West Coast, and at least three other major hurricanes in Florida, but the sound of this wind was other-worldly, she said.

 “I feel bad saying this, knowing what the people of Ukraine have been going through,” she said, as her back porch’s steel awning was ripped off of the concrete walls of her house by the hurricane’s winds, “but I’m actually scared.”

Zelensky will still visit France on Thursday as Ramstein meeting is pushed back a week

According to Macron’s press office, President Volodymyr Zelensky and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron will meet in Paris on Thursday to discuss the war in Ukraine and how France can help. The two are scheduled to talk at the Élysée Palace at 3 p.m. local time.

The next day, the Ukrainian president will meet with government leaders in Berlin, as scheduled, even as US President Joe Biden’s trip there to meet with Ukraine’s allies has been postponed due to the devastating hurricanes in America.

“This meeting will be an opportunity for the President of the Republic to reaffirm France’s determination to continue to provide further unwavering support to Ukraine and the Ukrainian people, together with our partners,” Macron’s press office’s release noted.

In a video on Wednesday, Kyiv Post offered a first look at dozens of Ukrainian soldiers taking lessons from French officers on field tactics, theory, and arms operations. The exclusive clip was provided to Kyiv Post by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Zelensky, Macron, and NATO leaders were slated to meet later this week for the Ukrainian Defense Contact meeting, aka the Ramstein group. However, Biden had to postpone his trip to Germany because of the catastrophic hurricane damage back home.

The summit has been rescheduled for Oct. 17-18 to coincide with a parallel NATO Defense Ministers’ meeting in Brussels.

It has also been reported that Zelensky is still expected to visit Berlin on Friday for talks with Chancellor Olaf Scholz and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Russia continues missile attacks on Odesa on Wednesday, this time killing five civilians

As Moscow’s forces continue to bombard the port city of Odesa with ballistic missiles, their latest strike on Wednesday, again targeting the port’s commercial infrastructure, killed five civilians and injured nine others.

“Five dead and nine injured is the consequence of yet another ballistic missile attack by Russian terrorists on the port infrastructure in Odesa region,” the Minister of Development of Communities and Territories, Oleksiy Kuleba, reported on social media on Wednesday. “All victims are Ukrainians. Currently, those injured are getting medical assistance, five are in serious condition,"

State news outlet Ukrinform reported that a civilian vessel flying the flag of Panama, the container ship Shui Spirit was damaged, the third foreign-flagged ship attacked by Russia in the last four days.

Despite international condemnation, Moscow continues to target cargo ships departing Odesa, many of which are providing grain to needy countries in Africa.