Footage from the brutal Second Battle for Donetsk Airport in the autumn of 2014 shows Russian-facilitated militants of the Donetsk Peoples Republic (DPR) direct firing an artillery piece at the air traffic control tower and making multiple hits. The shelling of the tower continued for the duration of the four-month battle, and it eventually collapsed in January 2015.

Despite the Minsk Protocol ceasefire agreement, the Russian-backed forces conducted an offensive operation to take the Airport and surrounding area in late September 2014, which was the only part of Donetsk still held by the Ukrainian troops and volunteer units.

The fighting was incredibly horrific, some of the worst seen in modern combat. Opposing units held down different floors of the same building and fighting was room-to-room. Eventually, in January 2015, the DPR used explosives to collapse an entire floor of the main airport terminal onto the remaining Ukrainian troops which was a significant factor in their victory over the Ukrainian forces. By Jan. 21, 2015, all Ukrainian troops at Donetsk Airport were either killed, wounded, captured, or in full retreat.