Snizhne or Snezhnoye (Ukrainian: Сніжне́, IPA: [s⁽ʲ⁾n⁽ʲ⁾iʒˈnɛ]; Russian: Снежное), formerly known as Vasylivka (Ukrainian: Василівка) until 1864, is a city in Horlivka Raion, Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine. The eastern edge of Snizhne is adjacent to administrative border of Luhansk Oblast. Its population is 45,767 (2022 estimate).^[2]

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Russian. (June 2014) Click [show] for important translation instructions. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Russian Wikipedia article at [[:ru:Снежное]]; see its history for attribution. You should also add the template {{Translated|ru|Снежное}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation. You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Ukrainian. (July 2014) Click [show] for important translation instructions. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Ukrainian Wikipedia article at [[:uk:Сніжне]]; see its history for attribution. You should also add the template {{Translated|uk|Сніжне}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Quick Facts Сніжне, Country ...

Snizhne Сніжне
City
Mining company office in Snizhne
Flag Seal
Snizhne Show map of Donetsk Oblast Snizhne Show map of Ukraine
Coordinates: 48°01′41.8″N 38°45′56.2″E
Country	Ukraine
Oblast	Donetsk Oblast
Raion	Horlivka Raion
Hromada	Snizhne urban hromada
Founded	1784
Incorporated	1938
Area
• Total	87.2 km2 (33.7 sq mi)
Population  (2011)[1]
• Total	49,564
Climate	Dfb
Website	snezhnoe-rada.gov.ua

Close

The settlement was established in 1784 as a "winter place" Vasylivka (Vasilyevka) by Don Cossacks and was part of the Taganrog city municipality. In 1864 it was renamed as Snizhne/Snezhnoye which literally means Snowy.^{[citation needed]}

During the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine the town was held by separatists. On July 15, 2014, rockets from an unidentified aircraft struck the town hitting an apartment building and a tax office, leaving at least eleven people dead and eight injured. Separatists blamed the Ukrainian Air Force for the attack, but Ukrainian sources denied it and stated that since the incident where an An-26 plane was shot down on July 14, 2014, they have carried out no flights there. Instead they blamed Russian jets.^[3]

After the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 on July 17, 2014, a YouTube video and photo emerged with citizen journalists claiming the material was from Snizhne and showed a Buk missile launcher.^[4] In September 2016 a Joint Investigation Team confirmed that the plane had been downed by a 9M38 BUK missile launched from a rebel-controlled area near the town of Pervomaiske, 6 km (3.7 mi) south of Snizhne.^[5]

Fighting for the control of the town between the separatists and the Ukrainian army broke out on 28 July 2014.^[6][7][8] Snizhne remained under the effective control of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic.^[9]

As of the 2001 Ukrainian Census, reported ethnicity and language preferences were:^{[10][needs update]}

Ethnicity

• Ukrainians: 51.3%
• Russians: 41%
• Belarusians: 1.0%
• Tatars: 0.9%
• Armenians: 0.2%
• Greeks: 0.2%

Language

• Russian: 84.1%
• Ukrainian: 14.8%
• Armenian: 0.1%
• Belarusian: 0.1%

• Snizhneantratsyt
• Snizhne Engineering Factory (a branch of Motor Sich)
• Snizhnianskkhimmash, a factory of chemical engineering
• Sofyino-Brodska train station

• Mine № 9
• Yuri Gagarin monument
• School №1
• Military museum
• Church
• Monument
• St. Dmytro Church
• Water tower
• Sofino-Bridska rail station
• Snizhne apartment blocks