Air-raid warnings were in effect during record 30.8% of shopping centre operating hours in September

Air-raid warnings were in effect for 30.8% of shopping centre operating hours in September, setting a new record.

Source: Ukrainian Council of Shopping Centres (UCSC)

Details: The figure stood at 14.1% in 2025 and rose to 22% in August 2026. All three monitored indicators increased over the month: the number of air-raid warnings, the number of warnings issued during shopping centre operating hours and their total duration.

Yellow-level warnings accounted for 60.9% of the total time covered by identified warnings in September, compared with 39.1% for red-level warnings. [In Ukraine's air-raid warning system, yellow-level warnings indicate a drone threat, while red-level warnings indicate a missile threat – ed.]

The UCSC defines shopping centre operating hours as 10:00-21:00. The top five regions where air-raid warnings lasted the longest during this period remained unchanged: Donetsk Oblast (92.2%), Zaporizhzhia Oblast (76.1%), Sumy Oblast (73.4%), Chernihiv Oblast (69.1%) and Kharkiv Oblast (58.0%).

Across these five regions, the share of air-raid warnings issued during shopping centre operating hours increased by an average of 7%. "This is noticeable, but not critical," the UCSC said.

Meanwhile, the figure increased several-fold in Cherkasy, Kirovohrad and Zhytomyr oblasts, where it now stands at a high level. Kyiv also recorded a significant increase, from 11.6% to 32.7%.

"From the perspective of the number of shopping centres in the capital and the quality of their tenants, this has become a real challenge for the industry," the UCSC said.

Nationwide, the average number of working days shopping centres have been forced to suspend operations due to air-raid warnings has reached 176.5 since the start of the full-scale invasion, including 9.6 working days in September.

Background: In the final week of August, air-raid warnings were in effect for 30.1% of Kyiv shopping centres' operating hours, up from around 3% in the preceding weeks of the summer.

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