Russian Drone Strike Targets Ukrainian Railway Just After Boris Johnson and Ex-CIA Chief Pass Through
A train carrying former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and former CIA Director David Petraeus may have been the target of a Russian drone strike that hit a stationary train near the Poland-Ukraine border, according to Ukrainian Railways. There were no casualties on the stationary train.
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The strike occurred during a massive, coordinated overnight assault across Ukraine involving more than 450 Russian drones and missiles. The barrage killed at least six people and injured more than 40 others, heavily targeting western Ukraine—a region that is typically quieter than Kyiv or the eastern frontline zones. Ukraine’s air force reported that it successfully intercepted 405 of the drones and four missiles.
According to Ukrainian Railways, the train carrying the high-profile western figures, alongside several European security advisers, had passed through the border crossing shortly before the drone strike hit a stationary engine.
Reacting to the incident on X, Boris Johnson condemned the attack: "I don’t know what warped logic drove Putin to blow up a stationary Ukrainian locomotive on the Polish border this morning. What we can say for sure is that this is the kind of random and senseless attack Ukrainians are enduring every day - even on civilian railways."
For passengers travelling on the network, the morning was marked by fear and rapid evacuations. Katerina Sergatskova, the director of Daily Humanity, an organisation providing training for high-risk environments, was on a Warsaw-bound train and witnessed the attack. She said passengers were forced to disembark for two hours in the middle of the night, and were later ordered to fully evacuate at around 9:00 AM as the train neared the Polish border.
A British economist, who preferred to remain anonymous, was travelling on a night train from Kyiv to the Polish town of Chelm when the attack unfolded. He recalled railway officials swiftly instructing passengers to hide in the bushes near a lake, describing the Ukrainian railway staff's emergency response as, “timely and disciplined”.
The strikes triggered air-raid warnings across the border in Poland. Authorities from both Ukraine and Poland confirmed that a lorry was also struck less than one kilometre from the Dorohusk-Yahodyn border crossing linking the two nations.
In response to the close-proximity strikes, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk chaired an emergency meeting. Tusk warned that escalating Russian attacks in western Ukraine could directly affect Poland in the coming weeks.
Russia’s defence ministry claimed responsibility for the strikes in western Ukraine, asserting that it had targeted, "railway infrastructure", being used to, "transport military cargo", from European nations.
The incident highlights a broader escalation as both Ukraine and Russia increasingly use long-range drones and missiles to strike critical infrastructure deep behind frontlines. While western Ukraine faced the brunt of the infrastructure strikes, the human toll of the overnight bombardment was felt elsewhere; three people were killed in the eastern Donetsk region, and a 71-year-old woman was killed in the southern Mykolaiv region.
Anxiety from the strikes also rippled into neighboring Baltic states. In Lithuania, authorities briefly closed the airport in the capital, Vilnius, after a suspected drone sighting. NATO scrambled at least one fighter jet in response to the alert, which was ultimately determined to be a flock of birds. The airport reopened within 40 minutes.
According to Ukrainian Railways, the train carrying the high-profile western figures, alongside several European security advisers, had passed through the border crossing shortly before the drone strike hit a stationary engine.
Reacting to the incident on X, Boris Johnson condemned the attack: "I don’t know what warped logic drove Putin to blow up a stationary Ukrainian locomotive on the Polish border this morning. What we can say for sure is that this is the kind of random and senseless attack Ukrainians are enduring every day - even on civilian railways."
I don’t know what warped logic drove Putin to blow up a stationary Ukrainian locomotive on the Polish border this morning. What we can say for sure is that this is the kind of random and senseless attack Ukrainians are enduring every day - even on civilian railways. So far Putin…
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) September 13, 2026
For passengers travelling on the network, the morning was marked by fear and rapid evacuations. Katerina Sergatskova, the director of Daily Humanity, an organisation providing training for high-risk environments, was on a Warsaw-bound train and witnessed the attack. She said passengers were forced to disembark for two hours in the middle of the night, and were later ordered to fully evacuate at around 9:00 AM as the train neared the Polish border.
A British economist, who preferred to remain anonymous, was travelling on a night train from Kyiv to the Polish town of Chelm when the attack unfolded. He recalled railway officials swiftly instructing passengers to hide in the bushes near a lake, describing the Ukrainian railway staff's emergency response as, “timely and disciplined”.
The strikes triggered air-raid warnings across the border in Poland. Authorities from both Ukraine and Poland confirmed that a lorry was also struck less than one kilometre from the Dorohusk-Yahodyn border crossing linking the two nations.
In response to the close-proximity strikes, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk chaired an emergency meeting. Tusk warned that escalating Russian attacks in western Ukraine could directly affect Poland in the coming weeks.
Russia’s defence ministry claimed responsibility for the strikes in western Ukraine, asserting that it had targeted, "railway infrastructure", being used to, "transport military cargo", from European nations.
The incident highlights a broader escalation as both Ukraine and Russia increasingly use long-range drones and missiles to strike critical infrastructure deep behind frontlines. While western Ukraine faced the brunt of the infrastructure strikes, the human toll of the overnight bombardment was felt elsewhere; three people were killed in the eastern Donetsk region, and a 71-year-old woman was killed in the southern Mykolaiv region.
Anxiety from the strikes also rippled into neighboring Baltic states. In Lithuania, authorities briefly closed the airport in the capital, Vilnius, after a suspected drone sighting. NATO scrambled at least one fighter jet in response to the alert, which was ultimately determined to be a flock of birds. The airport reopened within 40 minutes.
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