Analyzing Donetsk Shelling of October 1, 2014

March 1, 2023

(rough, incomplete)

One early shelling incident on October 1, 2014, has been most commonly cited as proof that the Donetsk Peoples' Republic or its Russian backers were themselves shelling the citizens of Donetsk. They would do this over and over, it was assumed, just to accuse the "Fascists" in Kyiv and their "UkroNazi" forces or "punisher brigades" arrayed all around the western flank of Donetsk. But here, it's claimed the ballistic evidence disproves their claim, and so well it can serve as a stand-in for hundreds of other incidents over the years. Thousands would be killed in these incidents, but just 11+ in the one we're looking at, that had 2 parts: 6-7 killed at a bus stop and on the bus, and 3-4 were killed at a school on its first day of classes, but luckily no children were killed.  

Pro-Kiev Analysis: A Russian/DPR False-Flag

One cited source has a page that still loads (uainfo.org), but the text is vague and the pictures that tell the story no longer load. They should be the same as shared here along with the link: 

https://twitter.com/michail777/status/517284322462937088

This seems to decide it came from the SW but within the city (10-15km), or from the NW, up to the airport, but nowhere past the line of contact in either direction (green). I guess it favors the SW angle over the airport, as others do (see below). The red line runs N-S, as shown in another image, circling a shadow, maybe to show the directions by sun - at around 10am, it would be from the SE. And then the rocket came from the left or west of that, with 2 directions competing, a 90 degree spread between them somehow ruled out ... 

... or as someone else read it, "Seems #Donetsk shell came from SE, implicating #Russia fighters, not #Ukraine." The findings must be explained in Ukrainian on this included image; I'll see about a translation. It indicates SSW or almost due south, and also southeast.  

Most others agree in reading it as from the SW, based on the embedded tube's angle. 

https://twitter.com/euromaidan/status/517283023793160193

Traces SW only to a point, some 14km out, still within the DPR-controlled city, noting "there is no AFU" there, and so "Militants of the DNR shell Donetsk, passing it off as shelling by the Ukrainian army."

https://twitter.com/GorseFires/status/517365353895063554

"Shelling by Russian-backed Forces at civilian targets, incl school, in Donetsk" - picture shows fire from the south or southwest, not from the airport. 

https://twitter.com/UkrainaSegodnya/status/517337119123972096

claim "VATA, look at WHO IS ACTUALLY LEADING THE SHOOT OF Donetsk in order to feed you news" - picture: same above but more elegant - it was someone to the southwest, not at the airport (right), nor in the center of the city (left). 

https://twitter.com/Vityushka_UA/status/517245394791981056

"For those not from #Donetsk: the projectile on Poligraficheskaya, which killed 8 people, came from the side of the city, not the airport (see diagram)."

https://twitter.com/MannfredNikolai/status/517386292179787776

"#Ukraine Footage from #Donetsk, showing, the projectile came from 'rebel'-held south south-east, not from the airport" Shown: 3 photos, one with the tube circled, no labels to indicate directions or to show he has any idea how to say the angle. The other southeast readings above seemed confused. But as it so happens, this one is closest to my own analysis (see below).

What is with this airport fixation? They act like if Ukraine had done it, that's the only place they could have done it from. But in general from 2014 to the present, probably at that exact time, Ukrainian forces surrounded the city on the western flank. At least the outer districts have always been surrounded a full 180 degrees including due north & south. Some places get hit from the SE or NE and it still points to UA-held areas at the time. So Southwest absolutely does not rule out Ukrainian forces. See mapping below.

Russian/DPR Sources

https://www.rt.com/news/192140-ukraine-school-shelled-donetsk/

At least nine people were killed and 30 others injured in Donetsk after a school and a bus stop came under fire, reportedly from Ukrainian army positions.

Three people died at the school and six others were killed at the bus stop, Donetsk City Council said in a statement on its website.

No children were killed in the shelling of school №57 on Wednesday, but the debris from the blast left two parents and a biology teacher dead.

The city council earlier stated that all 70 children studying at the school were in the building at the moment of the strike. They were hastily evacuated. The school building was damaged in the attack.

The Russian Foreign Ministry describes the attack is a cynical and blatant breach of international law.

“The particular cynicism of this shelling is the very fact that today was the children’s first day at school. And on this day, artillery directly targets them. These are blatant, intolerable things,” the ministry’s human rights ombudsman Konstantin Dolgov said.

Public transport has been changing routes due to the shelling.

One hundred and forty-six schools in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic had commenced classes out of 150, Minister of Education of Donetsk People's Republic Igor Kostenok said.

A ceasefire between the Ukrainian government and the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics’ authorities was signed in Minsk, Belarus, on September 5.

https://www.kp.ru/daily/26288/3167053/

The shell hit one of the schools in Donetsk on the first day of the school year

The capital of Donbass was shelled from the "Smerch". Our special correspondent Alexey Ovchinnikov transfers from the scene

https://sputniknews.com/20141001/School-Shelling-in-Donetsk-Grave-Violation-of-Humanitarian-Law-193519343.html

At least 11 people have been killed in shelling of the school in Donetsk on Wednesday. According to the city council, 70 children were inside the building when firing started. There has been no confirmation from the Ukrainian sources yet.

The Ukrainian government and independence supporters of the country's eastern regions agreed to a ceasefire during the September 5 Contact Group meeting in Minsk. Since the establishment of the ceasefire, the opposing sides have repeatedly accused one another of violating the truce.

Blood and damage at the school https://twitter.com/A_Knishenko_RT/status/517343468231069696

https://twitter.com/NOVORUSSIANEWS/status/517245392115994624

https://twitter.com/RussImperialist/status/517785628919226368

The junta is still functioning perfectly and is constantly shelling Donetsk and Luhansk.

Other Sources

Ukraine crisis: Shell kills four at Donetsk school - BBC News

Both sides blamed the other for Wednesday's attacks. The Kiev-controlled regional administration said rebels from the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) had opened fire with a multiple-launch rocket system. But DPR deputy leader Andrei Purgin told Russian TV that Ukrainian rocket launchers had targeted residential areas from as far as 40km (25 miles) away.

Ukraine: Forces must stop firing on civilians after nine killed in Donetsk - Amnesty International

Ukrainian and rebel forces must immediately end indiscriminate attacks in residential areas, Amnesty International said today after at least nine civilians were killed in strikes on a school and a bus in Donetsk.The latest attacks, which took place in the Kievskiy district of the city, came as Amnesty International documented a pattern of indiscriminate shelling and rocket attacks in the area by Ukrainian forces in the past 10 days.

“Ukrainian government forces must immediately stop firing on residential areas in Donetsk,” said John Dalhuisen, Amnesty International’s Europe and Central Asia Director. “Ukrainian and rebel forces are violating international humanitarian law by endangering civilians with indiscriminate attacks, despite the fact that attacks may only be directed against combatants.“These attacks are unlawful because Ukrainian forces are using weapons in populated areas that cannot be targeted with sufficient accuracy to distinguish between civilian objects and military objectives.”

Today’s attacks resulted in the highest civilian toll in a single day since a ceasefire was struck between Kiev and pro-Russian separatists in early September. Four civilians were killed in the shelling of a school, which had more than 50 children inside at the time, on the day schools across Donetsk opened following a month-long delay due to the armed conflict.Another five civilians were killed when a minibus was hit – either by rocket fire or a mortar. Six civilians were killed in Kievskiy district on Sunday, all in the same area as today’s attacks. 

In a visit to the affected area of Kievskiy on Monday, Amnesty International delegates saw a large rebel artillery piece sitting in the middle of a residential street, less than 10 metres from a house. “By basing military targets in residential areas, rebel forces have failed to take all feasible precautions to protect civilians and have endangered civilians in violation of the laws of war,” said John Dalhuisen.“By carrying out military operations in the neighbourhood, rebel forces share responsibility for these latest attacks with the Ukrainian forces.”

Amnetsy faults DPR forces for INVITING attacks, but seems to blame actual attacks on Ukrainian forces. Ukraine will not have been happy with that, as they were busy denying that, blaming the DPR "terrorists." An earlier Amnesty link given on Twitter is now broken. It may have only called out Ukrainian forces, with the update reflecting their counter-accusations, to "both sides" it so even "rebel forces must immediately end indiscriminate attacks in residential areas." https://www.amnesty.org/en/news/ukraine-forces-must-stop-firing-civilians-after-nine-killed-donetsk-2014-10-01

https://sputniknews.com/20141001/UN-Secretary-General-Condemns-Donetsk-School-Shelling-in-East-193531967.html

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has condemned the shelling of a school in east Ukraine's besieged city of Donetsk and described the incident as "particularly alarming," UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric told the press on Wednesday.

"We're very concerned of the reports of violence we've seen over the last two days. The shelling of the school is particularly alarming. Targeting of schools [is] unacceptable in any circumstances," Dujarric said in New York. ... According to Stephane Dujarric, Ban Ki-moon urged conflicting parties in Ukraine to strictly comply with the agreement reached in September in Minsk in order to "ensure sustainable cease fire."

My Own Analysis

I did my own geolocation first - using the school name to locate that, then checking nearby bus stops on Kyivsky prospect - one matched in a few minutes. That set directions for my analysis of the crime scene. Other sources I then found tend to agree on both points, just disagreeing on what it means. 

 

School №57 - location: 48.0498649,37.7809874 - address: 1 Yasnopolyans'ka St

An impact crater is shown, apparently at the corner just south across the street - Facade damage is to the south-facing main entrance, and damaged cars are parked just south of that. Just from some limited views, I'd say the shell responsible came partly from the south, maybe from the southwest or SSW. Facade damage, right side - quite a spread high and low - that's the forward direction. 

But the car damage is quite low on the car parked on about the same line, albeit much closer. All told...

Highest marks may be at left edge of the magenta box - tracing to the corresponding point at the roof points SE, but the roof isn't the measure - it's skewed a bit left of its ground-level footprint. Therefore, the line from impact crater to magenta's edge is roughly due north. This rocket came from the south. Isn't that where Kyiv had no forces? 

Bus stop - scenery match with minor, acceptable differences from 2011 street view - Kyivsky Prospekt, about 200m NW of the school. 48.0520607,37.7778159. I have more video and street views to show the site match, but why bother? Every source here already agrees on this obvious location. 

In this view, we face mainly south, like that bus was headed. The embedded rocket tube points back to the southwest, roughly 45 degrees to this (almost) north-south street. But this might reflect some bending on impact. The asphalt "splash" pattern of fragments from the rocket's underside is a more reliable clue, but not totally clear here. I trace the area of dense marks in orange, as far as I can see it, with the crucial forward edges left and right a bit unclear, coming out a bit concave (they're usually straight or a bit convex) and the pattern is also a bit asymmetrical - dense to the SW, looser to the SSE ... an angle up the street from the south or SSE seems like a best fit, but then denser marks to the SW look more like those in the direct rear usually look, plus the tube points that way, so I'll consider that in a range. But I feel that something closer to due south, or a bit SSE or SSW, is most likely. I don't think plain southeast can explain this pattern.  

Note that both pins for the bus impact and the school have their tips visible in the lower right view; they're basically at the same spot, and probably hit from the same angle, minus no more than one degree or so. And both readings tend to support each other in pointing less SW, less SE, and more plain south.

Were Ukrainian forces to the due south? The pro-Kyiv sources pointing that way, or mainly southwest, claimed there were none, at least not within Donetsk city limits. They read the direction decently, but pair it with an assumption that there were no Ukrainian forces to the southwest, or that they were too far out to have fired this shell. ...  But according to a plausible-looking map with this Tass report, in the days before this attack, they were to the SW (rough measure) about 22-25km out, and to the south, and even southeast, at a distance around 35-40km. Here with my estimated angles traced out (from Donetsk: range in red, most likely in black: about 35km).

But by this, DPR forces controlled areas closer in, and further out ~60km to the south (but nowhere else to the southwest). That is, UA forces controlled a span about 20km deep, and about 20km wide, to the south of these exact impacts. 

Also consider that hypothetically, either side could penetrate the others' territory, especially if it's briefly and for a special reason, like some false-flag or double-false-flag attack. By this map, both sides were a bit vague about control down here. If it turns out some short or long range use puts the origin in one of the DPR areas, it doesn't 100% prove their guilt, nor does the opposite 100% prove Ukrainian guilt. Still, it's a fairly strong indicator, which is why people try to asses where a munition came from. In this case, almost everyone did a decent job, just with some disagreement over what it means.  

An early analysis that gives a reasonable and common reading of SW origin, and agrees with me on the probable implications:

https://twitter.com/MilitaryMaps/status/517675715568099328

https://dragon-first-1.livejournal.com/6315.html

noting 35 km Uragan range, finding it was probably Ukrainian forces.

KP reported that "Smerch" was used. If that means BM-30 (Wikipedia), it can fire different rockets and maybe guided missiles up to 100 and even 200km, with standards that go 70-90km (to re-check). The Ukrainian-held pocket to the south spans about 40-60 km, so that would be a pretty normal or maybe short-range use. (Exact weapon identification is not my area)

My range of lines more to the south is sound and pretty clear, with distance being the crucial unknown I've never been good at determining. With a better measure to the front line, a clear estimate of the distance flown, etc. we could say for sure, but ... if it came from that ~20 km span, well, ... 

The Pattern it Fits

... that would fit Amnesty International's established "pattern of indiscriminate shelling and rocket attacks in the area by Ukrainian forces in the past 10 days." 

A center of the International Red Cross was hit in Donetsk the next day, October 2, killing a Swiss aid worker, in attacks involving cluster munitions. The New York Times would briefly join Amnesty in blaming Ukrainian forces, finding the ballistic evidence to be obvious (not that I've reviewed it) in indicating fire from Ukrainian-held areas.

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/21/world/ukraine-used-cluster-bombs-report-charges.html 

Amnesty has been called out for keeping some track of crimes by Kyiv's forces, who often seem to run wild. But even the New York Times was running this "Putin disinfo." This is why even the perpetrators could be convinced sometimes to chill out on this terrorism, and to generally keep the death tolls low but steady. 

School and bus and church and hospital attacks are all great, but usually they use small-to-mid-sized weapons, not heavy ones, and they don't go for maximum death toll, or target children especially. Eg. most schools are hit while not in session, and even here, the shelling at top of the hour only killed adults out front. Playgrounds are often hit, especially by scattering cluster bomblets, sometimes injuring or killing young children. But playgrounds big and small are all over, on just about every block - pretty hard to miss in an indiscriminate attack - and they're not usually crowded. From early on, the people have learned to shelter and move about only cautiously, also greatly limiting how many get killed. It's only been ... what, 14,000 killed, total even to now? 50,000 plus seriously wounded? I should look that up. Anyway, it could be worse, if everyone on the Ukrainian side just didn't care at all and went unhinged on the genocide stuff, and/or if the people there weren't so good at adapting to this new reality.

I didn't read ahead, but October 1 and 2 might be a point where some people move to reign others in, and the terrorism might chill out for a while. But it always comes back, even in 2023 - just days ago, an ambulance crew was killed in a double-tap attack (my analysis). The only thing that's changing this for the people - aside from some briefly-held ceasefires back in the day - is the Banderite punishers getting hammered further west, if slowly, and at great cost to all. But even that is often offset by new long-range weapon outsiders make available, at great cost to all - e.g. increased use of US-supplied HIMARS rockets, allegedly including on that ambulance. There's also an increased reliance on US-supplied 155mm artillery shells, with 50-100 of the tings fired into Donetsk city most days. That's our tax dollars, while our system decays and homelessness is growing here, to help pay for blowing up homes and lives in what they say is Ukraine, where the Ukrainian people's well-being is supposed to the paramount issue for the whole world.