ENGMore than 640 buildings in Kyiv were damaged by Russian rockets. What happened to them after a year?

In February 2023, photographs of a building on Lobanovskyi Avenue in Kyiv, which had been restored after a Russian missile strike in February 2022, started circulating on right-wing social media accounts in the US. The accounts shared a conspiracy theory that the war in Ukraine might be a hoax. A Russian missile ripped a hole several stories high up in a high-rise apartment building during the first days of Russia’s full-scale invasion. Now, the building bears no trace of the strike. Conspiracy theories claimed that the building had never been damaged, saying that it would be impossible to restore a building while the country is at war.

Kyiv proves otherwise. But the story of the city’s rebuilding efforts is not only a story of unmarred success; it is just as much a story of challenges that a city was not entirely prepared for.

More than 640 buildings in Kyiv have been damaged in Russian shelling and missile strikes, including 196 residential buildings. In 2022, the city government prioritized 17 of the most severely damaged buildings to be rebuilt. Eleven of them have already been restored, others are still a work in progress. Some buildings have not been included in the rebuilding programme despite citizens’ requests.

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The Village Ukraine investigates what’s happened to the damaged buildings on Lobanovskyi Avenue, Zhylianska and Chornobylska streets, and at the Lviv Quarter residential complex.

The high-rise at 9-A Chornobylska Street features a phoenix mural on one face, a symbol of rebirth. The building has been painted white and mint green, the walls have been insulated and tidy new paths lead to the building’s entrance.

Just a year ago, on 15 March 2022, the building was ablaze. It was hit by fragments of a Russian missile, which damaged a gas pipe on the building’s facade. Fire quickly spread to most of the apartments: half of the 126 flats burned down completely, the rest were partially damaged. Four of the building’s residents were killed.

An expert assessment concluded that the building’s load-bearing structures were not damaged, and the building could be restored. A representative of Askon, a construction firm responsible for restoring the building, told Deutsche Welle that the building endured the powerful explosion because it was built to an earthquake-resistant standard.

Olha Rodenko, who lives in the building, said that reconstruction work started in June 2022, and by November the building’s residents were able to start returning to their homes – just as Kyiv City Council promised. By the end of autumn, all utilities were working once again: the supply of heating, hot water, and power had resumed.

“The reconstruction plan they presented was very beautiful. To be honest, we couldn’t believe that the building would really look like that, that it wasn’t just a fantasy. But the building really looks just like the plan we were given said it would look,” Rodenko said. She adds that construction workers were on site around the clock. Around a hundred of them were brought in.

“The building hasn’t just been rebuilt, it’s been rebuilt in accordance with the most up-to-date building codes,” Rodenko says. The building – a 1980s panel block – now has a ramp, and a new wide entrance has been added for wheelchair users. Old Soviet elevators have been replaced with modern ones, the walls have been insulated, the building has been rewired and new plumbing has been installed. New, energy-efficient windows have replaced the old ones.

Water, gas and electricity meters have been installed in each apartment. The heating system now has adjustable thermostats. The city also paid for basic renovation in people’s flats: linoleum floors, new wallpaper, and interior doors. New bathrooms and kitchen stoves were added as well. “Everyone is fine-tuning the decor according to their own taste, but it’s important that they didn’t just give us the bare bones of our apartments, but helped equip them,” Rodenko says. She was able to move back into her flat in January 2023. Like most of the building’s residents, she is refurbishing and hopes to soon move back in permanently.

The city has allocated 100 million hryvnias [approximately US$2.7 million] for reconstruction work at 9-A Chornobylska Street, representatives of Zhytloinvestbud-UCB, a municipal developer commissioning the reconstruction of destroyed buildings in Kyiv, told Ukrainska Pravda.

A total of 11 out of 17 multi-story apartment buildings that sustained the most extensive damage in Russian attacks were restored in Kyiv in 2022. Restoration and expert analysis for the project cost 407.5 million hryvnias [approximately US$11 million]. The money was allocated from the municipal budget’s reserve fund. Reconstruction of another six multi-story residential buildings is scheduled to be completed in the next six months, with another 159.5 million hryvnias [approximately US$4.3 million] of the municipal budget allocated to this end.

Foreign media has taken a renewed interest in the building at 6-A Lobanovskyi Street in February 2023. A Russian missile hit the building on the third day of Russia’s full-scale invasion, tearing a hole several stories high. A year on, the building bears no traces of damage and destruction. Right-wing social media accounts in the US began sharing photographs of the building as “evidence” for a conspiracy theory that the war in Ukraine might be a hoax.

Foreign journalists got in touch with Olena Chumakova, who lived in the building, to fact-check the story. “I kept getting messages from AFP [Agence France-Presse, a French international news agency - ed.] and I’d send them photos in chronological order and my interview responses,” Olena says. “A lot of reporters from all of the largest global media came to see the building after the strike. When they come here now, without having been in Kyiv all this time, they’re surprised: ‘How could it be? Is the building really liveable again?’ I’ve been asked if it seems strange that the war isn’t over yet and everything’s already being rebuilt. All I have to say is: ‘How else are we supposed to live?’ There will be more destruction. And besides, all of these damaged buildings were a hazard to everyone around, they could collapse any moment.”

Sixteen flats of the 27-story building were destroyed. Though damage was localized to one section of the building, the entire building was in danger of collapsing if no work had been undertaken to reinforce it. In May 2022, the building’s residents decided to fund its reconstruction themselves. They raised 1.5 million hryvnias [approximately US$40,615], which they spent on clearing rubble and reinforcing the destroyed floors to prevent the building’s collapse. When the Kyiv City State Administration joined the reconstruction effort, it became clear that all of the floors above the hole made by the missile would have to be rebuilt. A construction site was set up near the building.

Demolition lasted most of the summer. “At first we panicked. To be honest, we were worried that the building wouldn’t be completed before the start of the heating season. It started on 15 October in most of the city, but only in the end of November in our building. Because the building wasn’t sealed yet and some windows were missing – it makes no sense to heat a building like that,” Olena Chumakova said.

The original plan anticipated the reconstruction lasting until April 2023, but construction workers were able to complete the job much sooner. “We were three times faster than anticipated,” Serhii Pynder, chief engineer for this project, says. He explains that the process had to follow a particular order: first demolition, to clear access to the building’s core structures. Then all the construction waste had to be taken down and special equipment to cut concrete had to be prepared.

Pynder explains that the complexity of a demolition process depends on how powerful the operating tower crane is and how much load it can bear. “Architects gave us construction plans and explained how to dismantle [the top floors]. Then we used the plans to carry out this work. We used a concrete saw to cut out all the elements we needed according to the plans,” he adds.

There were two shifts of construction workers working on the building: the first shift during the day and the second during the night. In early autumn, they were able to start rebuilding the destroyed floors. By the end of November, new walls had been erected, new windows installed, and the heating system could be switched on.

The building was cast in place: concrete was poured into a metal formwork to create walls, then floors were laid. The walls were then bricked. It took construction workers about a week to construct one story.

The building’s reconstruction was originally estimated to cost 50 million hryvnias [approximately US$1.4 million], though eventually the number was closer to 70 million hryvnias [approximately US$1.9 million]. Once, when the project ran out of money, works were suspended, Pynder says: “The mayor came and we showed him what we’d been able to do already, and once they had all the costs we were able to resume working on the building in two shifts.”

When Kyiv saw the first emergency blackouts in autumn 2022, construction entered the internal works phase. The builders were removing their equipment, often by lowering it from the building’s top floors on ropes: elevators were often not working.

The construction fence was removed in late December 2022, ahead of New Year’s celebrations. Still, only about half of the residents have returned to their flats, Olena Chumakova says. Many fled abroad. Those who were in the building when it was hit by the Russian missile, and who lost their homes, are the most afraid to return.

The building’s residents are planning a spring clean to get rid of what construction waste remains on the top floors and paint the facade at the bottom.

“Maybe if there’s money when the war is over we can make an installation to remind people of what had happened here,” Olena says. “We know the war is not over yet, but we hope that everything will work out.”

The story of Kyiv’s rebuilding is not just a success story. First and foremost, it is a story about complex challenges that the city was not entirely prepared to tackle. Residents of some of the buildings damaged in Russian attacks had to fight to be included in the reconstruction plans. This undermined their trust in the City Administration.

The Lviv Quarter residential complex near the Lukianivska metro station was hit by Russian missiles on two occasions. On 28 April 2022, the building’s section No.7 sustained damage. Vira Hyrych, a Radio Liberty producer, was killed in the attack. Two months later, on 26 June 2022, the neighboring section was hit: three of the building’s stories were destroyed, five of its residents sustained injuries, and one was killed.

A total of 27 flats were completely destroyed in the two attacks, and nearly 140 sustained damage but could be restored, according to the report The Village Ukraine obtained from Zhytloinvestbud, the municipal developer. However, the building’s residents say that it had not been included in the list of Kyiv buildings that sustained the most extensive damage until late summer 2022.

“The developers attended the military administration meetings and negotiated with the city planning department. Meanwhile, we created a charitable foundation [Save Ukrainian Home - ed.], got in touch with the ombudsman, and were doing everything we could to attract attention to our building,” Ivanna Ilchenko, a Lviv Quarter resident tells us.

The city administration included the building in the priority reconstruction program in August, but the works didn’t begin until December, leaving residents unable to spend the winter in their own homes.

Debris was removed, and a construction fence was erected. Reconstruction work began in late December when a crane arrived at the construction site. Askon, the firm in charge of rebuilding the apartment block at 9-A Chornobylska Street, was overseeing the works. “They are quite diligent, they’re working Saturdays and Sundays,” Oksana Stelmashchuk, another Lviv Quarter resident, says.

The seventh, eighth, and ninth floors of section No.3 have been partially demolished, and new structures have begun to appear in place of the destroyed ones. Construction workers are yet to build new walls, install windows, reconnect utilities, and repair the facade.

Vladlen Sterzhynskyi, Askon CEO, told Nash Kiev outlet that section No.7 requires the most work: nearly 60 flats in section No.7 were damaged after the missile hit the section’s second story. Before demolishing the destroyed parts of the building, metal support beams were installed on the damaged stories. Construction workers are now restoring the building’s key structural elements.

The Kyiv City State Administration has promised that the works will be complete by June 2023, but the building’s residents don’t believe construction will be over by then.

“Much work is stalled even at the tender stage. Some of those tenders haven’t even been held yet, for example ones for windows and doors. How will they be able to finish all works by June?” Ivanna Ilchenko says.

Construction workers have told the residents of section No.3 that they will likely be able to move back into their homes in September or October 2023.

The building’s residents worry that because the building could not be heated for much of the cold season some of the flats which are currently impossible to access might see the development of issues. The fact that the original developer failed to properly connect the building’s power system to the mains complicates the reconstruction efforts, as does the lack of clear communication with the municipal developer, Zhytloinvestbud, say the building’s residents.

The prospects of the building at Zhylianska Street, which was hit by a Russian drone on 10 October 2022, appear even bleaker. Half of the building collapsed, destroying four out of 16 flats. The Kyiv City State Administration said that the building could not be restored and offered all of its residents new apartments in a high-rise apartment block on the outskirts of Kyiv. But the building’s residents didn’t agree to this. They want to rebuild their homes.

“The building has not been sealed. It’s just as it was [after the attack]. We made sure all the windows and doors were closed to prevent homeless people from coming in; we’ve had some issues with that,” Tetiana Makhrinska, a resident of the Zhylianska Street building, says.

There isn’t even a fence around the building, so anyone can enter the partially destroyed basement. A fire broke out there in December 2022.

Last winter, the residents of the Zhylianska Street building registered an Apartment Building Co-owners Association. The status of a legal entity will enable them to seek funding from private donors, sign contracts with contractors, and register the land under the building. They are currently awaiting the results of an expert assessment of the building's condition.

“We have spoken to the city planning and architecture department of the Kyiv City State Administration and asked them to help us restore the building. We agreed that as soon as we have the results of the expert assessment and develop a plan, we will talk to them again and explain more concretely what assistance is required,” Makhrinska says. She explains that the building’s residents cannot undertake any reconstruction work without the city administration’s permission.

If the city is unable to fund all the necessary reconstruction works, the building’s residents are hoping to find private investors.

“We asked several architects whether it’s better to demolish the building completely and build anew, or to restore the damaged sections. We talked to different experts about how to keep the costs at a minimum, while ensuring that the building will remain sound for hundreds of years to come. There are several options, including renovating the destroyed part of the building,” Makhrinska explains.

The residents are currently waiting to obtain the results of the professional assessment and urban planning conditions; they will then devise a reconstruction plan, hopefully agree with the city administration on it, and begin reconstruction works. They have already found a contractor who will oversee the works.

The majority of the building’s residents are staying with their friends and family now as they keep in touch with architects and various foundations.

“We really hope that in the nearest future we will be able to celebrate the arrival of the first cranes and equipment. We would like to be able to sleep in our own homes by the end of the year,” Tetiana Makhrinska says.

Translator: Olya Loza
Editor: Sam Harvey