‘I can’t tell him his mother has died’: the cost of Russia’s assault on Kharkiv

Victoria Zubchencko and her 18-year-old daughter Diana, who lost an eye when the next-door building was hit by a rocket. Photograph: Dmytro Frantsev/The Guardian

There had been many long hours of rocket strikes and shelling before the attack that upended their lives, but always with grim warning, the explosions creeping closer to Diana Zubchencko’s ninth-floor home in Kharkiv.

Then, 10 days into the war, with no notice, their home was ripped apart and its contents hurled on top of the family. One minute they were cooking dinner, the next Diana was sprawled on the ground, bleeding so much from a head injury that her mother, Victoria, feared the 18-year-old was slipping away.