Fireball On The Bridge: Shock Footage Shows Russian Drone Exploding Into Kyiv’s Vital Northern Crossing As Cars Keep Are Driving Across

Dramatic video has captured the precise second a Russian drone slammed into Kyiv’s Pivnichnyi (Northern) Bridge, erupting in a towering orange fireball that lit up the roadway and sent a thick column of black smoke boiling into the morning sky while vehicles were still travelling across the span.

The footage, filmed from across the Dnipro River on Sunday, opens on an ordinary autumn scene: the capital’s eastern apartment blocks rising behind a band of trees, traffic flowing steadily over the cable-stayed bridge, and the water below reflecting the pale light. Within moments, the calm is torn apart. A bright blast blooms directly on the deck, the fireball swelling and reflecting off the river as debris and smoke surge upward. Cars remain visible on the lanes both before and after the impact, underscoring that the strike landed in the middle of civilian movement.

BBC-verified video of the same moment shows the drone striking the bridge before the explosion, matching the sequence that has circulated widely online. Separate images later revealed a gaping hole punched through the concrete of a traffic lane.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said two people were injured. One was taken to hospital; the other was treated at the scene. He also reported that a heating main was damaged, temporarily cutting off hot water supplies in the north-eastern Desnianskyi district. Emergency crews were sent immediately. Buses 22 and 91 were diverted via the Darnytsia Bridge while authorities assessed whether further restrictions were needed on the damaged span.

It was the second day running the Northern Bridge had been hit.

On Saturday, a Russian jet-powered drone damaged the road surface and severed overhead trolleybus wires, injuring two people and blocking traffic from the left bank to the right. Earlier in the week, the Southern Bridge was struck multiple times, forcing closures and gridlock on routes that link the two sides of the city. Russian officials have said the bridges were targeted because they are used to move Ukrainian troops and cargo. Ukrainian authorities have stressed the effect on ordinary residents who cross the river every day.

The Sunday strike came as German Chancellor Friedrich Merz arrived in Kyiv by train on an unannounced visit. Air-raid sirens sounded across the capital, including while he met President Volodymyr Zelensky. Merz later stood at the National Academy of Sciences, itself damaged in a recent drone attack only a few hundred metres from the German embassy, and said: “These are daily war crimes being committed here.” He added that if Russia is not stopped, “its war machine will sooner or later turn against us,” and called on Vladimir Putin to halt what he described as barbaric attacks on civilians.

Zelensky told his guest that people in Kyiv were enduring “terrible nights and days.” He has warned that Russia is systematically striking bridges, data centres, mobile networks and other civilian infrastructure in an effort to make life in the cities untenable. A fresh German aid package worth more than €1.3 billion was reportedly agreed during the visit, including support for air defence and energy repairs.

Klitschko has previously said the enemy is “tearing Kyiv apart.” Repair teams are working on the damaged heating line, and officials have discussed temporary pontoon bridges, ferries and even a tunnel to keep the two banks connected if the main crossings remain under repeated attack. For drivers who watched the fireball erupt ahead of them on an otherwise ordinary Sunday morning, the footage has already become another stark record of a capital under sustained assault.