Battle of Kyiv, 24 February - 2 April 2022

The battle, stage by stage

1. 24 February 2022, about 9:30 AM - 1 PM

   Helicopters over Hostomel

   Russia launches its full-scale invasion of Ukraine before dawn on 24 February; columns cross from Belarus at about 4 AM. Around 9:30 AM some 34 Russian helicopters - Mi-8 transports, Ka-52 attack helicopters and a few Mi-24s - fly low down the Dnipro toward Antonov (Hostomel) airport, about 10 km northwest of Kyiv's city limits; two lead helicopters are reportedly downed near the Kyiv dam. At about 11 AM the formation reaches the airfield, attack helicopters to the north and transports to the south. Some 200-300 troops of the 31st Guards Air Assault Brigade and 45th Spetsnaz Brigade land in two waves against about 200 soldiers of the National Guard's 4th Rapid Reaction Brigade, mostly new conscripts, who down at least two more Ka-52s and a Mi-8 before running low on ammunition. The Russians secure the airfield at about 1 PM; about 20 Ukrainians at the northern radar post are cut off and captured. (War on the Rocks; MWI Urban Warfare Project.)

2. 24 February, evening - 25 February

   The airbridge that never came

   Without tanks or artillery, the paratroopers form a perimeter. At about 5:30 PM Ukrainian artillery and Su-24 strikes open a counterattack by elements of the 80th and 95th Air Assault Brigades, the 72nd Mechanized Brigade and the 3rd Special Purpose Regiment; by about 9 PM Ukraine claims the airfield, and surviving Russians fall back into the woods to the west. Overnight, with Russian armor closing from the north, the Ukrainians pull out after cratering the runway, so that the follow-on landing of about 4,000 troops by Il-76 is reportedly called off. Russian ground forces from Ivankiv retake the airfield on 25 February. That day Ukrainian engineers blow the Irpin river bridges, including the Romanivka bridge and the Hostomel (E373) bridge, where a convoy of about 80 Russian special police (OMON/SOBR) is destroyed; the Kozarovychi dam north of the city is breached (24 or 26 February by different accounts), beginning to flood the Irpin valley. (War on the Rocks; MWI; Wikipedia leads checked against Ukrinform.)

3. 27 February

   Vokzalna Street

   Russian troops push south from Hostomel into Bucha. On the morning of 27 February, security cameras record scouts and then about two dozen BMD-2 airborne vehicles, a command MT-LB and a fuel truck rolling down Vokzalna Street toward the railway crossing and the road to Irpin. Fire opens at the Irpin entrance by the Zhyraf shopping center, where the 4th Company of the 72nd Brigade's 2nd Battalion and volunteers hold the bridge; the column turns back, halts, and is struck by artillery and drones, leaving burned-out vehicles for hundreds of meters (about 50 destroyed by one estimate; Kyiv claimed more than 100 items of equipment). Ukrainians blow the Bucha-Irpin bridge. North of the city a Russian patrol of 13 BMD-2s crosses the Moshchun bridge and is driven back. (Ukrinform CCTV chronicle; MWI; Ukrainska Pravda.)

4. 5-9 March

   Bucha occupied, Irpin under fire

   Russian forces take control of Bucha from about 5 March (UN monitors date the occupation 5-30 March) and of Hostomel, and push into northern Irpin. ISW reports a Russian ring north and west of Kyiv through Borodianka, Motyzhyn, Bucha and Demydiv. Thousands of civilians flee Irpin on foot across planks laid over the ruined Romanivka bridge; on 6 March Russian shelling of the evacuation route kills eight civilians, among them two children. Russian forces lay their first pontoon over the Irpin near Rakivka on 5 March and begin crossing toward Moshchun. On 7-8 March, on Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi's order, the Kozarovychi dam is breached further: the Irpin spreads into a marsh up to 400 m wide and floods the village of Demydiv. (ISW 7 and 10 Mar; OHCHR; MWI; RFE/RL; NPR.)

5. 9-10 March

   Ambush at Skybyn

   East of the Dnipro, Russian forces that drove down from the Chernihiv and Sumy directions - elements of the 90th Guards Tank Division and the 2nd and 41st Combined Arms Armies - reach the approaches to Brovary, having occupied Velyka Dymerka on 8 March. On 9-10 March a tank column of the 6th Tank Regiment advancing on Brovary along the M01 is caught at Skybyn by antitank teams and artillery of the 72nd Brigade's 3rd Battalion and other units, with a TB2 drone reportedly overhead. Drone video shows the column breaking up and retreating. Ukraine said the regiment's commander, Col. Andrei Zakharov, was killed (Ukrainian intelligence claim); Ukrainian accounts give about 19 tanks destroyed or damaged. CNN verified videos of the losses, and ISW assessed that the ambush disrupted the eastern encirclement. (ISW 10 Mar; MWI; OSW.)

6. 11-21 March

   Moshchun

   Unable to break through at Irpin, Russian commanders shift their effort north to Moshchun, about 3 km from Kyiv's city limits. Airborne troops and naval infantry - identified by RFE/RL as the 331st Guards Airborne Regiment and the 155th Naval Infantry Brigade among others - launch a major assault on 11 March and by 15-18 March have pushed the defenders of the 72nd Brigade and Territorial Defense into the southeast corner of the village. Brigade commander Col. Oleksandr Vdovychenko asks to withdraw and is refused; fresh battalions rotate in. Artillery and drones repeatedly destroy the pontoons over the flooded river. A counterattack from 19 March clears Moshchun by 21 March. About 2,000 of the village's roughly 2,800 buildings are destroyed. (MWI; RFE/RL; Kyiv Independent; Wikipedia-cited Washington Post.)

7. 22-28 March

   The counteroffensive

   From 22 March Ukrainian forces counterattack northwest of Kyiv and around Irpin, while Russian troops dig new trench lines in Bucha and Nemishaieve (ISW 24 Mar). East of the city Ukraine retakes Lukianivka and repels attacks toward Brovary. On 28 March Irpin's mayor announces the city has been retaken; Kyiv Oblast authorities confirm it and ISW reports it, and Reuters confirms Ukrainian control on 30 March. The same day Ukraine's General Staff reports two battalion tactical groups of the 106th Airborne Division leaving the Kyiv front. (ISW 24 and 28 Mar; Reuters.)

8. 29 March - 2 April

   Withdrawal - and what it revealed

   On 29 March Russia's deputy defense minister announces a 'drastic reduction' of activity near Kyiv. Ukrainian counterattacks push Russian forces north of the E40 highway, and the 35th and 36th Combined Arms Armies and the 76th Air Assault Division pull back into Belarus (ISW 31 Mar, citing Ukraine's General Staff). Ukrainian forces enter Bucha on 31 March - 1 April and Hostomel on 1-2 April; on 2 April Ukraine's Ministry of Defense declares Kyiv Oblast free of Russian troops. In Bucha they find bodies of civilians in the streets, yards and a mass grave by the church. The UN human rights monitoring mission documented 73 civilians killed in Bucha during the occupation (54 men, 16 women, 2 boys, 1 girl) and was corroborating 105 more; Human Rights Watch documented summary executions, including on Yablunska Street, where AP and PBS Frontline traced killings at a Russian headquarters at 144 Yablunska. Russia denies responsibility. (OHCHR Dec 2022; HRW 21 Apr 2022; AP/Frontline; ISW.)