Gdansk (PL) – Sokal (UA) – Ivano-Frankivsk (UA) – Vinnytsia (UA)– Medyka (PL/UA) – Lviv (UA) – Lutsk (UA)– Szczecin (PL) – Gdansk (PL) - 3376 km (2098 miles)
This time, as the mission was supposed to be longer and more places to be visited, it was more logistically complicated. It all obviously started in Little Chalfont scout hut
where all the donations were sorted, packed and sent over to the lorry base in Bedford.
Few days later, the lorry arrived at the base in a small village called Barcin, in the North-East Poland where the donations were loaded onto the ambulance and a van. Donations were taken to Gdansk, where Chris, Julia and a group of volunteers were working till early morning hours to sort and pack the ambulance. It is a challenge to pack an ambulance in such a way that every single space is used! Finally, about 6 a.m. in the morning, the ambulance was loaded and ready to go! Julia and Chris slept few hours and they left to Ukraine.
The first stop we made, was a public organisation “Territory WE” in Zabuze, Lviv district. This organisation helps the refugees fleeing from the eastern Ukraine, which is under a constant fire. We donated sleeping bags, mats, food as well as nappies and toiletries. We received a lot of gratitude for all the donations!
It started to rain. We said our goodbyes and we continued driving to our next stop, which was Ivano-Frankivsk. After driving through Radekhiv, which only few days before, had been destroyed by missiles, we saw a beautiful rainbow – a sign that the peace will eventually come back on Earth.
Then, we arrived in Ivano-Frankivsk (detailed location needs to stay secret), which is the main quarters of the Resistance and Medical Help. As soon as we left the ambulance, we heard the sirens announcing the bomb alarm. We had to leave the ambulance behind, we grabbed the first response bag and run into the bomb shelter. We saw hundreds of children to whom being in the shelter became an everyday reality.
We listened to stories that some of the children went through in Eastern Ukraine. Stories that are impossible to comprehend and that are too brutal to pass on.
After the alarm was finished, we could finally leave the shelter. We were relieved to see that the ambulance had not been destroyed! We drove to City Children’s Hospital to meet with the Hospital’s Director and we handed over the medical supplies.
We also met with army representatives and started offloading the donations – this time the frontline items - our goods were transported using an internal channels to Donetsk! We also liaised with local coordinators who gave us the detailed lists of what is needed the most at the frontline.
After having a short coffee break, we received the information about our first patient. This gentlemen was a tetraplegic and had been evacuated from Kharkiv on the floor of a minibus as there had been no other means of transport. We agreed to meet them half way. We received a permit to travel at night (pass the curfew time) and we arrived at Vinnytsia. It was Very late at night.
We met with a volunteer Zenia, who introduced us to our patient. Patient was lying on a floor, on a mattress, in freezing cold and was wrapped with a belts that are normally used for transporting goods. Despite those awful travelling conditions, our patient was in good spirit and extremely happy to be evacuated from Kharkiv.
As soon as we had our patient on the ambulance stretchers, we heard a bomb alarm! We had no idea what to do! It was night, pitch black, we had no idea where the nearest bomb shelter was. Besides, shelters are usually in the basements and we wouldn’t be able to get the ambulance stretchers over there! We went into silence to figure out what kind of an alarm this had been – bomb or chemical. “Luckily” it was a bomb one. We were terrified as we were parked next to the petrol station – any bomb dropped on the petrol station would cause a massive explosion that none of us would survive! We looked up at the dark sky and the only thing we could think of was to evacuate ourselves as soon as possible. The volunteer that dropped the patient of was too tired to drive back and he slept in the back of the minibus. After driving for an hour, we were stopped by a coach, who was evacuating civilians from Dnipro – they had an elderly lady on board who suddenly felt really unwell. We provided the medical care to her and she could continue the journey.
We crossed the Polish border very early morning and handed over our patient to Polish ambulance service. Tired but happy, we went to bed.
