Kherson, Ukraine – In late November, 22-year-old Maria from Poniadivka in southern Ukraine gave birth to a boy.

She named her second child Ivan in honor of his father, who had dreamed of having a son since joining the army in 2023.

Baby Ivan was the only child born that day at the Kherson Regional Maternity Hospital, a city where more people die than are born and more people decide to leave than stay.

According to local authorities, only 15 babies were born in December, while 256 people died and 311 fled.

As Kherson dies, its 83,000 residents (the pre-war population was more than 320,000) are focused on surviving Russia's relentless bombardment and what locals call the "human hunt."

Last summer, the Russian military appeared to adopt a new tactic.

They began flying dozens of drones in southern Ukraine to track cars and pedestrians in video game-like chases. According to Ukrainian officials, they dropped explosives on civilian targets, causing serious damage.

Local officials said at least 16 people were killed and 144 injured in these attacks in November and December.

The city council estimated that while only 5% of casualties in June were caused by drones, with the rest caused by artillery and missiles, six months later, in December 2024, drones were responsible for 60% of the attacks against civilians. attack.

"Children don't have a normal childhood. My daughter doesn't go to kindergarten. I can't even take her for a walk," Maria said, her eyes fixed on her newborn.

Starting in December 2022, the delivery room where she gave birth was hit by Russian missiles five times in two years and moved from the fourth floor to the basement. Russia has not commented on the attacks.

Construction work to restore the hospital has begun.

Kherson was the first major Ukrainian city to fall to Russian forces, days before Moscow began a full-scale invasion, but Ukrainian forces later retook the city.

A large and strategic Black Sea port and home to the shipbuilding industry, pre-war Kherson was a vibrant, culturally rich coastal city. In a 2021 study co-funded by the United Nations Development Program, 80% of residents said it was a great place to live, work and raise a family.

But the war changed everything.

The seaside maternity hospital faced Russian troops occupying the river bank. Her village is not safe. She moved to a neighboring settlement where her family found respite amid ongoing shelling and drone strikes.

The move may have saved her life. In the summer, her house was destroyed in a drone strike.

"It's scary sometimes, but I'm used to it. My five-year-old daughter told me: 'Mom, look, there's a drone buzzing.' "The kids understand everything," she said.

Fearing for her safety, Maria asked Al Jazeera to withhold her last name and refused to be photographed.

“The Russians in Kherson not only terrorized the population, they also trained them”

Local officials said that on most days, 30 to 60 Russian drones fly over Kherson.

Russia has consistently claimed that it did not intentionally target civilians, which is a war crime under international law, but those denials have been refuted by Ukraine, global rights groups and witnesses.

“The Russians in Kherson not only terrorized the population but also trained civilians. They practiced in Kherson and then moved to the (eastern) Donetsk (region) where the fighting was more difficult due to close contact. We Many videos showing Russian soldiers chasing people were intercepted,” said Anton Yefanov, 44, deputy mayor of Kherson.

He told Al Jazeera that in December and November last year, "drones had penetrated further into the city and Russians started looking for public and social transport". "There has also been an increase in shelling."

As of press time, the Russian Defense Ministry had not responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.

In the streets of Kherson, the echoes of the explosion echoed in the air with frightening frequency.

The city feels like a ghost town with islands of life. Concrete bus stops are in place to provide additional shelter for commuters, but they are no guarantee of survival in the event of shelling. Residents are often advised to stay home.

There were few cars on the empty roads and even fewer pedestrians who dared to walk. Most of those who choose to stay are elderly and unwilling or unable to move to safer areas of Ukraine.

Some professionals have returned to Kherson because internal displacement threatens their livelihoods.

Maria and her family lived in Odessa for a few months, but prices were high and her salary was low, so she returned to her hometown.

'It just keeps following me. Of course you would be scared in this situation'

Aleksander Dorofeyev, a native of Kherson, returned from Poland at the beginning of the war to "make himself useful."

He collaborates with the International Aid Center in Poland, which provides humanitarian support to people with reduced mobility and disabilities.

But helping those in need is fraught with risk.

In November, as he was inspecting renovation work at his NGO-sponsored outpatient clinic, he noticed a drone buzzing above his car.

"It kept following me. Of course you get scared in situations like this. You need to speed up to be faster than the drone, but that only happens when you're driving on a straight road, a highway. Drone It can fly at speeds of up to 130 kilometers (80 miles) per hour," he said.

"They come out of nowhere, they look at you, and if they're up high you can't hear them before they drop their bombs. In the city, there's no way to escape them."

In early January, a drone targeted the minibus driven by his colleague. The vehicle fell to pieces. The man remains fighting for his life in hospital.

"From an economic point of view, Kherson is a half-dead city, but from a humanitarian point of view it is still inhabited," said Deputy Mayor Yefanov. "Someone has to help them, with water, heating, with people with disabilities. What scares me the most is that I can't do my job here."

Some observers worry that despite Ukrainians' enthusiasm for peace talks, Kherson's ordeal is unlikely to end anytime soon.

In October 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that four occupied regions - the self-proclaimed "people's republics" of Donetsk and Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporozhye - would be annexed Russia.

A month later, Ukraine liberated Kherson. Annexing it remains a Russian goal, but this is unlikely as the two armies are locked in a positional battle on both sides of the Dnieper.

"They want to capture Kherson, but at the moment this is unrealistic. The Ukrainian military is concealing their whereabouts from enemy drones so that the Russians can hunt down civilians," said an expert at the local Black Sea Political and Social Research Center in Odessa Vladimir Molchanov said.

"This is an attempt to intimidate the population and force people to leave so that it will be easier for Russia to take over the territory and maintain its corridor to Crimea."