On the night of September 13, Russian drone strikes triggered a fire at a gas station near the Yahodyn border crossing, at the far west of Ukraine. The site was located less than one kilometer from Poland.
Flames and thick smoke were filmed as firefighters responded on site. According to Valentyna Chernysh, spokesperson for the Volyn customs, the fire was caused by drone debris falling on a gas station and several trucks parked near the Yahodyn border crossing. The checkpoint itself remained intact and no injuries were reported on the Ukrainian side.
Traffic was temporarily suspended during the air raid alert, with customs staff and travelers taking shelter. Controls resumed once the alert ended, while rescue teams continued their intervention. Footage also shows damage to a nearby road.
That same night, other nighttime strikes hit the locomotive of a passenger train connecting Kyiv to Warsaw, about two kilometers from the Polish border. The public railway operator Ukrzaliznytsia specified that passengers and crew were evacuated as a precaution, with no injuries reported.
These attacks target western Ukraine, a region so far largely spared from the most intense fighting concentrated in the east of the country. The Yahodyn-Dorohusk border crossing is one of the main routes for military and humanitarian aid from Poland and other Western countries.
The Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Andrii Sybiha, considered these strikes to go beyond an attack on Ukrainian territory alone. He described these acts as “Putin’s terror [qui] striking directly at the doors of the EU and NATO” and called on European countries to strengthen sanctions against Moscow.
Polish authorities confirmed that the strike site was about 800 meters from their border and that no injuries were reported on their territory. Damage assessments were ongoing on both sides of the border.
