At 4 p.m. every day, the Kyiv Independent office goes dark.
After hours of working without heating, the electricity disappears too. The generator shuts off for thirty minutes to cool down. Laptop screens become the only light in the room. The only sound is the tapping of fingers on keyboards. Cold hands move slowly, stopping every so often as people breathe warm air into them to regain feeling.
Outside, temperatures drop to -15 degrees Celsius (4 degrees Fahrenheit). Inside, it doesn't feel much warmer. Nobody takes off their jacket when they arrive at the office anymore. Hats stay on, scarves are wrapped tight. Every so often, someone walks past covered with a blanket. These days, it is the only way to stay seated for more than an hour.
"It definitely became harder to think and concentrate on anything, not just work," Video Creator Nastia Kasinchuk says.
After Russia's mass strikes on Kyiv's energy infrastructure on Jan. 9, 70 percent of the city was left without electricity, and over 6,000 residential buildings lost both heat and light. As of Feb. 24 — the four-year anniversary of the full-scale invasion — more than 1,100 residential buildings remain without heating in Kyiv's Dniprovskyi and Darnytskyi districts.
For many Kyiv Independent staff members, the office – despite the cold – became one of the few places where electricity and stable internet could still be relied upon.
Olesia Meleshko is the Kyiv Independent's office manager. Her job used to mean coordinating logistics, keeping the kitchen stocked, and ordering printer paper. Now, it means sourcing blankets and portable radiators.
Since the Jan. 9 strikes, she has been rotating between her sister's place and friends' apartments, returning to her own home only briefly. Fifteen minutes here and there to quickly grab clothes, before leaving again.
"I took my first hot shower yesterday," Olesia said after the Jan. 9 strikes.
Finding ways to keep her colleagues a little warmer, she says, is one of the things keeping her going.
For Videographer Olena Zashko, working from home offers little relief. The warmest room in her apartment reaches about 15 degrees Celsius (59 degrees Fahrenheit) on a good day — 6 degrees Celsius (42 degrees Fahrenheit) in some rooms on a bad day.
An EcoFlow battery keeps her laptop and Wi-Fi router running during outages, while gas burners provide temporary heat.
It helps, she says, "but only for a short time."
Her most reliable source of warmth is Marseille — her cat, who has taken to sitting on her legs while she works.
"He truly keeps me warm," she says. "And that's not a joke."
And if you don't have a cat? Kyiv Independent Junior Marketing Analyst Mariia Borodulia actually set up a tent in her apartment — the small pocket of air inside is much easier to warm up than an entire room.
Earlier this year, Olena reported from Kherson, speaking with residents living under Russian occupation. The experience reshaped how she views the hardships of winter in Kyiv.
"Sitting in a cold apartment is not the worst thing," she says. "What's worse is sitting with electricity and heating while under Russian occupation."
Business reporter Dominic Culverwell now organizes his entire day around the question: Is the power on? Laundry, vacuuming, cooking — small routines that once felt ordinary now depend entirely on electricity schedules.
Kyiv is comparable in size to cities such as Madrid, Rome, Chicago, and Seattle. Here, everyone lives by the same rhythm. Residents across the capital compress daily life into brief windows of light and heat whenever power returns.
As Dominic puts it, it is "just depressing" for the 21st century.
Asked what keeps him motivated through the cold and uncertainty, he answers: "The thought of spring."
The team is not going anywhere. The Kyiv Independent keeps reporting, every day, making sure the world knows exactly what Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine looks like from on the ground.
The blankets help. So does the cat.
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