“The noise of the bombs woke me up, I packed my bags and ran,” Maria Kashkoska, 29, told AFP, crouching on the floor of the subway, where she found shelter.
Shocked, this businesswoman said she was “prepared for any eventuality.”
On the balconies, worried and questioning looks could be seen: Was it an airstrike, explosions? What objectives were achieved?
An hour after that panicked awakening, nobody knew anything, no information was leaked about the origin or purpose of these explosions in or around the capital.
Without waiting to know, the inhabitants of Kiev set out.
The avenues were filled with traffic while it was still dark. Cars full of families were leaving the city, heading west or towards the countryside, far from the Russian border, located 400 km away.
If the eastern front is where the bombing seems heaviest, no region of Ukraine seems to be safe.
At the other end of the country, in the coastal city of Odessa and even in Lviv, the western city where the United States and other countries moved their embassies, the sirens, announcing the urgent need for shelter, also sounded every 15 minutes.
“Keep calm!” Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov wrote on Twitter.
“If possible, stay at home. The situation is under control… Your calm and trust in the Ukrainian armed forces is the best help at this time,” he said in a message to the population.