Bomb by Bomb, the Slow Death of My Hometown in Ukraine
It was possible, for a time, to think that Kramatorsk, where I was born and raised, would survive the war mostly unscathed. Not any more. Police medics responding to an early morning bombing of a residential area in Kramatorsk, Ukraine. Credit... Tyler Hicks/The New York Times By Olha Konovalova The New York Times Sept. 29, 2026 Olha Konovalova has been covering the war in Ukraine since 2022. On the morning of Aug. 4, two Russian guided bombs, each weighing more than 1,000 pounds, struck the residential block where I grew up in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine. I learned of the attack from social media, scrolling through videos until I recognized a neighboring building in flames. Then came the frantic search for any piece of information on whether my home had also been destroyed. Finally, a man who still lives in my building sent me a video, filmed from inside my flat. The fire had spared it, but not the blast. Shards of glass covered the floor. In the kitchen, the window frame had bee...