In the early morning of 15 February 2023, the Ukrainian army shelled Donetsk Hospital No. 9 in the Proletarsky district with a Smerch multiple rocket launcher with cluster munitions. At the same time, the Ukrainian army also shelled the Tchyorvonogvardeysky district of Makeyevka with a Western-made HARM anti-radar missile.
At around 7.30am this morning, the Ukrainian military shelled several civilian areas in the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR). The first strike was carried out with an AGM-88 HARM missile against the Tchyorvonogvardeysky district of Makeyevka. It landed on a residential building, damaging the roof and shattering windows on several floors. Nearby buildings were also damaged. The fact that the bombing was carried out with Western ammunition clearly indicates that it was the Ukrainian army that bombed this purely residential area.
The moment of the missile explosion was filmed by a resident's dashcam:
Just minutes after this bombardment of Makeyevka, the Ukrainian military fired two Smerch rockets with submunitions at the neighboring districts of Budionovsky and Proletarsky in Donetsk. One of the rockets fell on a garage of Hospital No. 9 in Proletarsky district, and the other fell in Budionovsky district, dropping their submunitions en route, damaging many homes in Budionovsky district and injuring one civilian.
Photos of cluster munitions :
Fortunately, the huge rocket (3 m long and 30 cm in diameter) did not fall directly on the main hospital building, but on a garage, thus miraculously avoiding numerous civilian victims among the patients. Firefighters had to search for hundreds of meters for the multiple submunitions dropped by the two Smerch rockets in order to destroy those that had not exploded.
See my report on the spot :
As a reminder, this is not the first time the Ukrainian army has deliberately shelled a hospital in Donbass. In mid-December 2022, the Ukrainian army repeatedly shelled the Kalinina hospital in Donetsk. On 31 December 2022, the Ukrainian army shelled the hospital in Pervomaisk in the LPR (Lugansk People's Republic) with Himars, injuring 6 people. And on 28 January 2023, the Ukrainian army shelled the hospital in Novoaïdar in the LPR with Himars, killing 14 civilians and injuring 24.