By Olha Chepil | 2026-02-02

Ukraine is bracing for another wave of extreme cold. The country's weather agency warned last week that temperatures could plunge as low as -30°C (-22°F), even as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy cautioned that Russia was preparing fresh missile and drone attacks on energy facilities.

In Kyiv alone, city officials said some 600 buildings remained without heating after repeated strikes on power infrastructure.

The warning came after weeks of mounting strain on daily life in the capital, as Kyiv residents tested how much routine could survive under attack.

Lessons of perseverance

On January 12, after a missile strike knocked out heat and electricity across large parts of the city, parents at Gymnasium No. 48 expected classes to be canceled. Instead, before dawn, a message appeared in their phones: "We are open and waiting for children to come to class!"

Many parents doubted it. With temperatures at -15°C (5°F), the school had already drained its heating system to prevent frozen, burst pipes. Earlier, city officials had urged anyone who could leave Kyiv to do so, reinforcing the expectation that schools would close.

Elementary school teacher Lyudmila Vorobyova decided otherwise.

"I woke up in the morning and thought that we won't give up so easily. The children, who are 6-7 years old, are freezing at home. We need to somehow give them the opportunity to be warm and in class. I did my hair -- thank God the electricity was on at home for a couple of hours -- and went to the school," Vorobyova told Kontur.

Teachers improvised. They found a space heater, switched on infrared lamps, and began warming classrooms as best they could.

Only five students from Vorobyova's class arrived that morning. Many families struggled to travel in the extreme cold. Still, she remained upbeat.

"In any case, it's warm here. They can move to live here," Vorobyova joked.

Across the city, Kyiv residents were making similar adjustments.

Anastasia Vergeles, program director of the Social Innovation Foundation "From the Country to Ukraine," spent several days in an unheated apartment near the opera house. The older building lost heat quickly, forcing her family to concentrate gas and electric heaters in a single room and live there.

"On Kyiv's Left Bank the situation is even worse. They turn on the lights for us for a couple of hours at least, but there it's completely nothing. Many people come here to the Right Bank to visit their friends and relatives to warm up," Vergeles told Kotnur.

Cold without precedent

Energy experts described Kyiv's situation as the most severe since the war began.

Oleksandr Kharchenko, director of the Energy Industry Research Center, said the conditions had no parallel.

"In reality, never has there been an attack at -15°C on a city with central heating that was also destroyed," Kharchenko said in an interview with BIHUS.info.

Some infrastructure was damaged by direct missile and drone strikes. The cold compounded the damage. Without electricity, circulation pumps stopped moving hot water through heating mains. In subzero temperatures, water froze inside the pipes, threatening to shut down the city's life-support systems.

Kharchenko credited utility crews working around the clock between attacks with keeping Kyiv functioning. Their repairs prevented a complete collapse.

To offset the damage, authorities expanded a network of so-called Unbreakability Centers across the capital, where residents could warm up, charge phones, drink hot tea and rest. Emergency services also deployed mobile warming stations, even as temperatures dropped to -20°C (-4°F).

"We have set up an additional 45 tents in 30 locations, primarily in the courtyards of the residential buildings where the situation is most difficult," Svetlana Vodolaga, press secretary for Kyiv's State Emergency Service, told Kontur.

More than 9,000 people have already used the mobile stations, according to the agency. The tents remain open whenever electricity is available, even if only for a few hours.

"The main thing is that people feel that they are not alone in misfortune," Vodolaga said. Some residents worked remotely with a cup of hot tea, others studied online in warmth, and some simply talked while charging their phones. Rescue workers, psychologists and other specialists staffed the sites around the clock.

Ukrainian Railways added its own version of Unbreakability Centers by converting dining and compartment cars into heated "Unbreakability Cars." One railcar was dedicated to children, stocked with coloring books, cartoons and board games. Residents could also bring pets inside for warmth and food.

Refusing to break

The New York Times reported in January that Russia's strategy at this stage of the war appeared aimed at making life in Kyiv untenable, with the goal of crushing morale and forcing capitulation.

Vergeles said the Kremlin underestimated Ukrainians. Many residents prepared in advance for a difficult winter, buying power banks and generators and bracing for outages.

"Of course, previous years had no such intensely cold weather, and we felt these inconveniences less. But everyone had purchased power banks and generators, so we basically knew something would happen. And it did happen," she said.

Days after the strikes, Kyiv authorities formalized what had already become an emergency routine. Mayor Vitali Klitschko announced that schools would close from January 19 until February 1 because of "difficult conditions" caused by sustained attacks on the energy sector. City officials also reduced street lighting to one-fifth of normal capacity to conserve electricity.

For Vergeles, resilience appeared in small, personal moments. She recently went to a hair salon powered by a standalone battery. With limited electricity, the stylist washed her hair in a cold room using barely warm water to ensure enough power remained for other clients.

She described the experience as an unexpected moment of solidarity.

"We dye our hair. We take care of ourselves. We want 'normality,' and we just want to live. Russians won't understand this. They won't be able to break us," Vergeles said.