Echo of the war in the rear area city of Slavuta

During the week, the Russian army attacked Khmelnytskyi Oblast four times, but all enemy targets were shot down by the Air Defence Forces. On three occasions, there were no destruction or casualties, but on the fourth occasion, the downed air targets fell on a critical infrastructure facility and caused a lot of damage in Shepetivka Raion, with the communities of Netishyn, Krupets, Slavuta and Ulashanivka hit hard. An explosion damaged personnel facility of the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant as well.

An Ukrinform reporter visited Slavuta and one of the nearby villages, whose residents experienced horrors of the night of October 25.

People recall that when they heard the explosions and felt the shockwave wave, they thought that an earthquake had occurred or even the Khmelnytskyi NPP had exploded. Today, many dwellings have broken windows and doors, damaged roofs, stoves, household appliances, and motor vehicles. Almost half a hundred people sought hospital services after the attack. Some have been taking sedatives all these days and cry when recalling that night, while some children have begun to panic and fear the dark.

Everything that people built and accumulated for years has turned out to be so fragile. But they console themselves that they have remained alive and do not have time to constantly mourn, because nowadays it rains almost every day in Khmelnytskyi Oblast and winter is on the way, so it is necessary to quickly repair the roofs and cover the windows. They do it with faith in God and hatred for Putin.

UAH MILLIONS IN DAMAGE

I came to Slavuta by bus and, walking through the streets, heard conversations about recent events everywhere. People discuss them at the bus station ticket office, in the market, in stores and near street cafes. This cozy and tidy rear area city is now scarred by war.

According to the mayor Vasyl Sydor, the damage caused runs into UAH millions, but the final amount cannot yet be established, as well as the exact number of affected structures, because their examination is ongoing.

Vasyl Sydor

– There is not a single military installation within Slavuta community, –the mayor says. – We had a military unit stationed here until 2006, but then it was disbanded. Now an industrial park has been created on the site, where a company manufactures sanitary ware.

According to Vasyl Sydor, a blast wave passed through the city, as a result of which about 240 apartment blocks were damaged, as well as almost 80 single-family homes and buildings housing 28 educational and cultural institutions, 7 health care institutions, the city council, the police, and the court.

– In the vocational college alone, 257 windows were damaged, as well as the roof, resulting in approximately UAH 1.5 million in damages. The commission is still recording the impact of the attack. Our task now is to cover the contour (windows and doors – Ed.) with a film so that people feel warm and comfortable for now, because it takes more time to manufacture insulating glass units. In dealing with the consequences of the attack, we are getting help from by the State Emergency Service, as well as other communities that provided equipment, worker teams, and materials.

Kindergartens have already resumed operations in Slavuta, and the educational process in schools is to start next week. Now a mixed format (partly in person, and partly remote learning) is being considered as an option.

THE BLAST WAVE RESEMBLED AN EARTHQUAKE

Together with a city council employee, we go to a neighbourhood that was hit by the blast wave. Grey apartment buildings with mutilated windows and balconies stand out sharply against the background of yellow and crimson trees. It was the five-story buildings that took the brunt of the damage, protecting the single-family homes, where the destruction is somewhat more limited.

I enter a small store, the owners of which are repairing the ceiling that did not survive that fateful night. Nearby, a saleswoman is serving customers. Businesses in the city rebuild while working and cannot stop, so they carry out forced repairs at their own expense. Bread and duct tape, which people use to tape over mutilated windows, are currently in the greatest demand in the store.

Natalia Kuzmich has been working there for a long time. The woman shows on her phone a picture of what she saw in the store after the explosions: slabs from the ceiling fell down. Fortunately, they did not damage the goods.

Having purchased goods in this store, Liudmyla Kovalchuk offers us to walk with her to her home.

– I heard my husband shouting “Earthquake!”. When I opened my eyes, the apartment was full of light. Our son was in the kitchen at that time, he saw a ball of fire and shouted: “Fall down!”. I fell on the floor, and our son was lying in the corridor, and we started to think that he was dead. And then this wave, god heavens... We heard glass flying, ran out to the entrance, and saw all the stairs were covered in broken glass. We had the balcony door torn off and thrown onto the carpet. The windows in the kitchen and nursery were broken, but nobody was harmed. Our boiler was torn off even, we will look for a craftsman to reinstall it, because it is cold in the apartment, – the woman shares her memories.

Liudmyla Kovalchuk

Her neighbour Pavlo Shevchuk was watching TV at the time. First, he saw the flash, then he felt the house shake, and then the blast wave arrived.

Pavlo Shevchuk

– The TV immediately fell down next to me, and glass covered me from above, – the man recalls. – I came out, neighbours ran crying with their children, some were helped to get out of their apartments. My friends helped me cover the windows with film. I now have no cornices, curtains, TV, or refrigerator. The police came and recorded what happened in my apartment.

In parting, the man says: “You know what? God is there. I don't know where he is, but he is definitely there.”

In this five-story apartment building, employees of the Slavutaservice municipal company are tightly covering the windows with film. They say they spend a whole day on one entrance. Some people cover the window frames in their homes by themselves.

Tetiana Khramenkova lives nearby in a single-family home. She came to the store wearing a gown and slippers and now hurries home, where she still has to put things in order after the blast wave.

“It hit my bathtub, we will remove the ceiling in the kitchen now, and everything is down on the floor in the summer kitchen. When I saw a glow on that night, I thought it was something to do with the nuclear power plant (Khmelnytskyi NPP, located near Slavuta – Ed.). At first, I wanted to barricade the windows, but then decided to open them wide, and it saved them. I hid under the table myself, because I have a mirror surface on the ceiling, but it only cracked. Then my mother called and told me she had all the windows and the balcony blown out in her apartment,” Tetiana recalls.

Tetiana Khramenkova

A kindergarten is located in this neighbourhood, and it was hit as well. According to its head Natalia Tkachuk, 34 windows, two each of entrance, evacuation and interior doors, as well as the entire security system, need to be changed in the institution.

Natalia Tkachuk

PEOPLE REPAIR ROOFS WHILE IT IS RAINING

A village near Slavuta also felt the effects of the blast wave. Almost no household has escaped damage. The picture that people saw that morning they call “Armageddon.” Now every farmstead sees a lot of work, because the owners are in a hurry to fix the roofs and cover the windows before winter comes. Repairs continue under the rain, which falls several times a day. The villagers are trying to put things in order as soon as possible, because many of them have elderly parents there who also need to be helped.

Viktor Darchyk

Viktor Darchyk lives on the edge of the village. At the entrance to his farmstead, there is a wheelbarrow full of broken glass, surrounded with torn metal sheets of a painted fence.

“I went up to the window that night, something rustled ‑ and all the windowpanes flew by me. Thank God that my daughter and grandchildren left a few days ago, for their beds were covered with glass after the explosion. I had four windows blown out, which I immediately covered with plywood. On the first day, relatives were quick to help with materials, and our community supported me as well. When the wave hit, all the slates on the house roof rose and then fell, and the rafter supports broke. The summer kitchen was renovated just a month ago, and everything there is torn away now. It’ll have to wait till spring,” – the man says showing us his farmstead.

Opposite his house, neighbours are repairing their roof. They have already had their windows covered with film.

– A window frame flew over my head, it flying 5 cm lower would have killed me, – Oleksandr Chornoloz recalls. – I was stunned, and my wife lost consciousness. When it hit, it broke everything and destroyed half the house, damaged the barn and the motor vehicle. The windows and doors were blown out, the roof lifted, the slates were torn off, the fence that had just been erected collapsed. The entire village is like this. Now we don’t know what to do first and where to get what. I asked a few friends, and they are helping me now, because I have had a stroke, so I cannot do much. People have had stoves broken up; they have no heating now. My in-laws are requesting my help as well. We have already made some repairs so that rainwater does not flow in. It is such a calamity, what else can I say... Putin has been cursed by so many people so many times, and he continues to launch drones and missiles at us.

Oleksandr Chornoloz

In the house nearby, half of the windows and doors were blown out as well, and the roof came off. The owner Oleksandr Kovalchuk is a businessman and shows the lorries that were parked in the yard at the time of the explosion. There are no windows in the cabins, the glass is cracked in some places, and the metal details in the trailers are twisted so much that even the tools cannot straighten them. Here, the villagers also restore everything with their own hands.

The blast wave also reached the school, in which not a single unbroken window remains.

ALMOST HALF A HUNDRED INJURED

As we heard from Leonid Radzyviliuk, the head doctor of the Slavuta City Hospital, following the events in the city, people began to seek his institution’s assistance as early as 04:20 am. Some were brought by an ambulance, while others came on their own. In total, 46 people with injuries of varying severity sought hospital services. As of October 27, 10 patients were still in the hospital, most of them in the trauma ward, a few in the surgical ward, and one in the intensive care unit. Their lives are out of danger. Some patients were sent to specialised healthcare facilities for treatment.

Leonid Radzyviliuk

The head doctor says that the hospital staff reacted quickly and adequately to such a flow of injured people.

Patients of the Slavuta Hospital refused to talk to us.

The intensive care room No. 7 is shared by two elderly women. The daughter of one of them, Nina Rabcheniuk, comes out when she hears about the journalists.

Nina Rabcheniuk

– My mum is 87. She went outside and the blast wave hit her against a sharp concrete corner. It did a lot of damage at my place as well, but we immediately went to my mum, because she lives alone. When we arrived, she lay down covered in blood. Mum has a crack in her skull and jaw. Now she periodically loses consciousness, – Ms Rabcheniuk told us.

Local residents are worried, confused and scared, but in dealing with a shared calamity, they console themselves with the fact that, fortunately, there were no fatalities.

Iryna Chyrytsia, Zhytomyr – Slavuta

Photos by the reporter