Mar 7, 2022 – The artillery barrage began at dawn – and fierce fighting around the strategic Black Sea city of Mykolaiv has been continuing throughout the day. The region’s administrator claimed their forces had managed to drive out the Russians once again, declaring that they were “retreating and running away”. The city, home to around half a million people, has become a key target in the embattled Ukrainian south. The Russians are now in control of Kherson and are pushing west, where there is a battle raging for control of Mykolaiv, with Odesa in their sights.
March 11, 2022 – The Mayor of Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine has told Sky News that Russian troops are starting to surround his city.
March 20, 2022 – Dozens of Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in a Russian missile strike on a military base in Mykolaiv, in southern Ukraine. The strike is one of the deadliest attacks on a Ukrainian military target since the start of the war
May 6, 2022 – In southern Ukraine, Mykolaiv is the first major city behind the front line, as the nation’s army faces off against Russian forces to the southeast in occupied Kherson. As such, the town has seen regular bombardments and nearby combat that led to its water supply being severed in mid-April. Throughout the ordeal, the city’s inhabitants have come together in solidarity and mutual support to help those in need.
May 28, 2022 – Many neighborhoods across Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine are now deserted as Russia attacks the port city.
July 7, 2022 – At the beginning of March, Mykolaiv was threatened by the encirclement. If this happened, the city could repeat the fate of Mariupol. One of the crucial battles at the time was events at the military airfield in the south and the civilian airport in the north of Mykolaiv. Russian airborne captured both of them. But the defenders of Mykolaiv managed to recapture first the airfield quickly and then the airport. Local patrol police officers played a significant role in these battles. After the beginning of a large-scale invasion, a group of police officers ready to take part in combat was created.
Later it was nicknamed «Danilyvtsi» (after its leader, the head of the local patrol police department Vitalii Danila). These patrol police officers took assault rifles and grenade launchers and went against the Russian special forces. Over time, the «Danilyvtsi» became a well-known and elite unit. Their arsenal of weapons increased — up to the appearance of a cannon. Now they do not patrol the streets of Mykolaiv but participate in combat missions in the Kherson direction. And they are ready to carry out orders to liberate a neighboring city of Kherson from Russians.
July 23, 2022 – In an interview with The Telegraph, Vitaliy Kim, Head of the Mykoloiv Regional Military Administration, revealed that he intends to close the city for several days to investigate those they suspect are collaborating with the Russian state. Mr. Kim confirmed that authorities had already arrested a dozen people who were found to have been colluding with Russia. The residents will be notified before the closures so that they can make arrangements and ensure they have enough food in their homes.
August 27, 2022 – Before the full-scale Russian invasion, they worked the same way as their colleagues in other fire departments in Ukraine. Now, in addition to extinguishing fires, they have another important task – to survive under extensive Russian shelling because they work on the front lines. The Halytsynivka volunteer fire department was formed in 2015. Back then, the village council realized that the nearest fire department of the State Emergency Service did not have time to cover their territory as well.
By February, they were fighting fires that humans mainly caused. After the Russian invasion, their community, located on the border with the Kherson region, found itself in a war zone. Now fires are most often caused by Russian artillery. Fires that sometimes cover forest hectares must be extinguished under enemy shelling. Fire on the firing line — how Mykolaiv region firefighters deal with it, see the report by Diana Butsko and Mykhailo Meshcherinov.
October 25, 2022 – Following two overnight Russian missile attacks in Mykolaiv, Ukraine, residents deal with the ensuing wreckage and uncertainty. CNN Chief International Correspondent Clarissa Ward reports on the scene.
November 1, 2022 – Since the beginning of a full-scale war, the 59th Motorized Infantry Brigade named after Yakov Handziuk has been knocking out invaders from Mykolaiv and Kherson regions. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi has repeatedly noted the 59th Brigade in his addresses. We arrived in the South of Ukraine at 59th to show how the Grad MLRS unit works.
Nov 30, 2022 – She used to be known as a world champion powerlifter. Now Anna Kurkurina is famous in Mykolaiv, Ukraine for feeding and rescuing dogs and cats left behind by their owners fleeing the war. She tells Newsy’s Jason Bellini why this became her pet project.
December 27, 2022 – There where the kirza rustles in the steppe and the yatra grows green, where the Scythians built mounds, where the royal roads ran, where the Greeks built cities, where the Cossacks went to the Turks through the estuaries to the sea.” Such words from an old song and pieces of history can be used to describe this region – the village of Lupareve in Mykolaiv Oblast. Until November 11, this village was the southernmost point of the entire front controlled by our troops, there were already Russians in the neighboring village. They flew into the village every day, there were a few dozen people left from the locals, some of them lived in the school basement, others continued to catch bulls in the old fashioned way under Russian fire in order to feed their families.
At the beginning of September 2022, we visited this village, found ancient Cossack crosses, the place where Mazepa and Karl crossed the estuary, felt the spirit of the Ukrainian Black Sea region and tried once again to debunk the myth of the “Russian Nikolaev region”. The main character of our film was the colorful uncle Vasyl, whom we met by chance near his yard. Vasyl is in love with his native village and its history, for him the words kind, family, Cossacks, estuaries and Ukraine mean too much. The material was created within the framework of the “Life of War” project with the support of the Laboratory of Public Interest Journalism and the Institute of Humanities (Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen).
July 18, 2023 – Russia’s Defense Ministry has said that overnight attacks on the two port cities of Odessa and Mykolaiv were “mass revenge strikes.” The strikes came a day after an attack on the Kerch Bridge linking Russia with Crimea, which Moscow blamed on Ukraine. Military analyst Sean Bell has stressed the overnight attack on Odesa “renews the worry” that Russia is again interested in having a land bridge all across the Black Sea.
July 20, 2023 – Russia has said any ships travelling to Ukraine’s Black Sea ports will be seen as possibly carrying military cargo. Defense and security analyst Professor Michael Clarke says Moscow’s threat is “ridiculous” and that “no one believes it” – but says the motive is to play on the insurance industry which will see no ships sail towards Ukrainian Black Sea ports without damage coverage.
July 20, 2023 – Mark Esper, former Defense Secretary under President Donald Trump, joins CNN’s Kaitlan Collins to discuss Russian strikes in the southern city of Odesa, Ukraine.