October 5th, 2026

Politics - 5 Drones crash in Moldova

- Russian drone strikes  

- Rafale training to begin “soon”

Combat Ops - Strikes continue - targeting bridges 

- Small grains on ground

Economics  - Hyrvnia trades above 45 to the dollar for the first time

Weather

Kharkiv

62 and partly cloudy. Partly to mostly cloudy through the week. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 60s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

63 and mostly cloudy. Partly to mostly cloudy for the next 5 days. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 70s. Winds westerly, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

58 and cloudy, gusting to 20. Partly to mostly cloudy through Thursday morning, then some clearing but rain on Friday. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 60s. Winds westerly, 5-10kts.

Politics

Russian drones - 5 total - crashed in Moldova Saturday morning. There does not appear to have been any damages, and no casualties. It is not yet clear how the drones “crashed.”

President Zelenskyy reported that 2 x Russian drones struck a Turkish owned ship, in neutral waters (western Black Sea, near Romanian territorial waters), killing 2 crew; the 11 other crew have been taken off the ship.

The vessel, Royad Mammadov (St Kitts & Nevis flag, 456 ft, 6900 deadweight tons), is damaged but afloat and in the Romanian EEZ; the ship had a load of corn and was en route Italy.

President Zelenskyy announced that UAF pilots will begin training on Rafale aircraft “soon.”

"New defence deliveries are now being prepared, and we expect a new package to arrive in Ukraine soon. We discussed its contents. Ukrainian pilots will also begin training on French Rafale aircraft in France in the near future. This is a strong step for Ukraine's combat aviation."

Ground Operations

Infiltrations continue along much of the line of contact and Russian activity appears to have increased a small amount both along the border east of Sumy City and along the border north of the Oskil River and then west towards Vovchansk. While there have been several small Russian gains in the area, there is no indication that there has been any substantive change in control of terrain.

Further south, in the terrain east of Lyman, fighting continues and Ukrainian forces may have made some small gains over the past 4 days, and may have reached the west bank of the Zherebets river, just north of Zarichne, along a spot in the river that was long ago broadened into pond-reservoir. There are two spots to get across the river, one just to the north and one just to the south of the pond, both are fairly narrow and are wide open with no real cover. Meanwhile reporting continues to indicate that there are small Russian elements still in the Ukrainian rear.

Weather has been cool and there has been some rain, but it is not clear whether off-load movement has become too difficult yet.

Infiltrations also continue into the northern edge of Kostiantinivka, Druzhivka and Dobripillia, but, again, there is no clear indication that there has been a substantive change in the amount of terrain controlled (though the propaganda reflux continues unabated).

On the southern front, fighting continues around Orikhiv, to the west, to the north-east, and south-east, but Russian forces are not inside that town, right now. To the north-east, along the T0408 roadway, Russian forces appear to have reached the eastern edge of the town of Omelnyk (6 miles up the road from Orikhiv), and have pushed into the east side of the town, but Ukraine forces are holding the center.

Air and Maritime Operations

Both sides continue the long-range drone / cruise missile strikes. 

Both sides also continue the drone sniping across the front lines into the immediate rear (the vast majority less than 5 miles out). These attacks can involve from a handful to scores of FPV drones per day into any given village.

Ukrainian Forces

Ukrainian forces continued long-range strikes against Russian oil and logistics grids.

Facilities struck on the 1st include Lukoil Oil Refinery in Volgograd City, and the Samara facility in Samara Oblast.

On the 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian missiles struck and Iskander ballistic missile site in Bryansk Oblast and a Russian strike drone launch complex near Tsimbulova.

On the 4th Ukrainian forces struck Khanskaya Airbase and claim to have destroyed a Su-34 and a Su-35.

Russian Forces

Missile and drone strikes continued throughout the weekend, though it is of note that there are some contradictory and incomplete reports on numbers and types. As noted before, the UAF stopped providing detailed reports on numbers of Russian missiles launched or numbers intercepted. However, it appears that there were well more than 100 drones launched on each of the last 4 nights.

Drone hits were reported in multiple oblasts.

What is of note is that there were more strikes on bridges and on data centers.

Southern Bridge in Kyiv City was struck multiple times on October 1st and 2nd, in what Mayor Klitschko called 4 waves of drone strikes. Southern Bridge, as discussed last week, is a reinforced concrete - suspension bridge and would require multiple strikes with drones (particularly given the relatively small warheads) in order to seriously damage the bridge. 

On October 3rd Northern Bridge in Kyiv City was struck. Northern bridge is also a cable stayed reinforced concrete bridge and would also require multiple drone strikes to cause serious damage. 

Zelenskyy’s office noted that Russian forces are now using a network of repeaters to improve accuracy of Russian drones in the city by giving drone operators real-time control of the drones.

Of note, part of this network appears to be using the local internet grid. No one has suggested whether the recent strikes on the various data centers (27 data centers struck since September 20th) is, in some way abetting the setup of this network.

Kyiv is a city of 3 million, a metropolitan population of 3.5 million and is split fairly evenly in half, connected by 5 major bridges and several smaller bridges. So, while the damage to the bridges appears to be minimal (so far), even 1 small strike on a bridge is going to close the bridge at least for a short period of time and cause a tremendous amount of heart ache in the city. And, repeated strikes, without a chance to repair any damage, might result in cumulative, severe, damage.

President Zelensky noted yesterday that Russian long range strikes for the period September 27 - October 4th included 1,900 strike drones (800 jet-powered), 25 missiles of various types, though most were ballistic), and 1,700 glide bombs.

I again note that the glide bomb strikes continue to sustain a rate of over 200 per day.

In response to Russian jet-powered drones, Ukraine is increasing production of jet-powered drone interceptors. Per President Zelenskyy’s postings, current the intercept rate of propeller-driven drones is about 85%, the current intercept of jet-powered drones is 50%. 

The UAF is deploying 12 x .50cal anti-drone turrets inside Kyiv (the city) and another 8 at spots around the oblast (outside the city).

Zelenskyy again commented that the F-16’s 20MM cannon remains the most effective system against the jet-powered drones. 

Zelenskyy also noted that Russia is believed to already have an inventory of 700 ballistic missiles and are producing 130 per month.

Economic Reporting

         Feb22  Jun8 Jul9          Aug7 Sep8 Oct2 Oct5

Brent      94.71   93.82 77.93 81.75 98.19 99.77 102.00

WTI     92.10   90.59 73.11 76.66 93.28 89.66 90.49

NG       3.97       3.14 3.12           2.64 2.95 2.96 3.05

Wheat     8.52  5.82   6.06   6.35   7.46 6.87 6.93

Ruble     85           73.10 76.31 82.61 86.21 83.54 84.85

Hryvnia 28.6 44.64 44.51 44.73 44.63 44.99 45.05

Urals 91.66 86.33 57.80 79.19 89.44 105.55 114.76

ESPO 94.52 95.51 73.53 78.79 98.44 101.45 N/A

Sokol 99.31 89.90 71.56 77.42 94.09 107.25 107.24

The Hryvnia has traded above 45 to the dollar for the first time. This followed the news that the projected inflation rate for 2027 has been increased to 8.9% and the hryvnia expected to be trading above 48 to the dollar by the end of 2027.

From 1991 (Independence) through 2008, the Hryvnia traded below 5 to the dollar, and from 2008 through 2014 traded below 8.3 to the dollar, then jumped above 20 to the dollar late in 2014, and inched up to 28 to the dollar between early 2015 and spring of 2022 (after the war started). It then jumped over 35 to the dollar and stayed there until November 2023; it has been slowly inching up since then.

Russian grain shipments through the Black Sea for the three month period July - September has fallen to 5.6 million metric tons, down from 11.3 million tons last year for the same period. Meanwhiles, shipments out of the Baltic have increased 465% since September 1st, and shipments by train to China have increased from 2.3 million tons in 2024, to 5.8 million tons in 2025 and are on pact to reach 9 million tons this year.

Thoughts

The war continues and the fighting continues to evolve. Ukrainian forces reaching the Zherebets River north-east of Lyman is of note; whether they have the forces to exploit it remains to be seen, particularly at this point in the year. They’re likely to make raids across the river but sustaining forces in the rain and mud of the autumn may be quite difficult.

Meanwhile the Russian gains north-east of Orikhiv are also of note, and again, there is the issue of whether it can be sustained as the weather turns cold and wet.

Of the two, the Ukrainian gain to the Zherebets has the most tactical impact and the Russians will need to flow forces to plug that hole - and there are reportedly 4 - 6 additional regiments moving into the area for that purpose alone. We’ll see if they get their in time.

As for the town of Omelnyk - a town of less than 200 when the war began, and now, based on images on line, fairly badly mauled - if, indeed the Russians have reached the town, this squeezes Orikhiv and brings the southern front into focus. Taking the town would allow Russians to attack Orikhiv from the north-east and west and threaten the GLOCs just as the weather forces movement back onto the roads. If Orikhiv is further squeezed, Ukrainian forces will need to pull logistics support back further and weaken their hold on the southern line. Said differently, this could have a significant operational impact; Ukrainian forces they need to hold Orikhiv and holding Orikhiv means they need to hold Omelnyk.

v/r pete