Journalists collected stories of Odessans whose entrance was destroyed by a Russian drone

The Svoi Dim platform has created a special project "Neighbors. Our home was destroyed by Russia", which collected stories of residents of the house at 134 Dobrovolsky Avenue in Odesa.

As Yulia Stupka, the platform's editor, told Intent, the journalists recorded video interviews with survivors, discussed artifacts that survived the attack, and told the stories of those who were searched for under the rubble for 17 hours.

There were 36 apartments in the building, four on each floor. The smallest ones were one-room, the largest ones had five rooms. 93 people lived here. Some families were abroad at the time of the attack.

"One of the heroes, Serhiy Haidarzhy, showed me a cardboard cup with a picture of a twig that his wife Anya had painted. She was killed along with her 4-month-old son Tymofiy. The man rarely visits the destroyed apartment because it causes him pain. Instead, he often goes to the grave and brings white flowers that his wife loved so much. Serhiy actively tells foreign media about the tragedy so that the crimes of the Russian aggressors become known to the whole world," the authors of the project noted.

The Haidarzhy family rented an apartment on Dobrovolskoho Avenue for six months. Their daughter Liza was 2 years old, and their son Tymofii was 4 months old. Serhiy and his daughter survived because they slept in another room. The bodies of his wife and son were found in the basement after 17 hours of searching. After the examination, he learned that his family had died in their sleep. Anya and Tymofii did not feel any pain. They were covered with a blanket and mattress.

On the night of the tragedy, 26-year-old Svetlana Karnitsova realized a long-held dream of working for the camera. However, she wanted to become an actress or journalist, not an eyewitness to her own grief. Svitlana knew everyone in the high-rise building: from the 1st to the 9th floor. She still had a box of cake in her apartment that her neighbor Hanna had brought her the day before the tragedy. The 73-year-old woman died that night.

96-year-old Nadezhda Bodrova had not been outside for more than two years. She broke her hip and uses a walker to get around. Her grandson Volodymyr moved in to take care of the old lady, so they were forced to live together. On the night of March 2, Nadiya could not sleep for a long time. Volodymyr was also awake. As soon as he dozed off, there was an explosion. The grandmother asked her grandson what had happened. He told her the truth.

The attack on March 2, 2024, was the deadliest for Odesa since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in terms of civilian casualties.

The Russian kamikaze droneattack on the city of Odesa on March 2, 2024, claimed the lives of 12 civilians, five of whom were children. On the night of March 2, the Russian military attacked the city of Odesa with Shahed-136 attack drones. One of the drones hit a 9-storey residential building in the Peresypskyi district of the city, part of the entrance with 18 apartments was completely destroyed, and another 36 apartments were damaged. The rescue operation to find people trapped in the rubble lasted almost two days. In total, 20 civilians were injured in the attack, including one pregnant woman.

Кирило Бойко