“I remember that I slept very badly that night. I had a bad feeling. » At the edge of a destroyed bridge, Vadim evokes the bygone days when one could still drive to the southern district of Voznessensk, on the other side of the river. A time when this robust 40-year-old entrepreneur did not yet wield arms. Only a month – a month already – since Russia launched its army on Ukraine, and like him, everyone remembers that fateful day, February 24, when the country and all its inhabitants fell into war.
It was at 5 a.m. that day that Vadim was awakened by the sirens of this city in southern Ukraine. “I thought it was a drill, or someone had triggered them by mistake. » But immediately, calls flood in to his phone. Rockets hit kyiv, and many other cities in the country. Barely has he time to digest the information when a terrifying explosion rips the dawn apart. An air strike has just ravaged the nearby airfield. Vadim understands that no one triggered the sirens by mistake. And that her eldest son is in danger.
→ REPORT. War in Ukraine: in Voznessensk, the rout of Russian troops around the corner
Kirill, 17, is a cadet at the National Naval Academy in Kherson, just 100 kilometers from Crimea. The city has just been bombed. Russian troops will be there soon. Vadim gets dressed in a hurry, jumps in his car and speeds as fast as he can. On the road, he discovers, in the opposite direction, an endless column of vehicles fleeing Kherson – 20 kilometers of traffic jams on the Mykolaiv ring road.
Vadim makes a trip that usually takes two hours in just over an hour. “I called Kirill to tell him to meet me on the outskirts of town, to save time. » This is where he finds him around 8 am, accompanied by two other cadets. The young people climb aboard the vehicle, Vadim puts the gas. They arrive around noon in Voznessensk. An hour later the Russians reached the outskirts of Kherson.
“I started preparing for the worst”
In kyiv, it was at 4:15 a.m. that explosions pulled Artiom Chernomorov out of bed at the Natsionalny hotel, where members of the Rada (the Ukrainian parliament) are staying in the capital. The 34-year-old MP for Yuzhnoukrainsk grabs his phone, watches his parliamentary group’s Telegram channel: ” You have seen ? “, ” you heard ? “, ” it started… “ A message from the leader of the deputies of Servant of the People, the party of President Volodymyr Zelensky, asks to go to Parliament as soon as possible.
In the taxi, Artiom Chernomorov calls his parents in Mykolaiv and the mayor of Yuzhnoukrainsk. Both towns were bombed. He arrived at the Rada around 6:30 a.m. The session did not last more than fifteen minutes. “All the representatives of the country were gathered under a glass dome, we had to act quickly. » With one voice, the deputies vote for the adoption of martial law.
→ REPORT. In Yuzhnoukrainsk, life in the shadow of a Ukrainian nuclear power plant
On leaving, the chosen one discovers the panicked inhabitants who are trying by all means to flee the capital. “I wasn’t scared, I was flabbergasted. Shocked to understand that an all-out offensive had just been launched against the largest country in Europe”he says today in an office in Yuzhnooukrainsk, where he coordinates, pistol in his belt, clandestine deliveries to the territories occupied by the Russian army. “After the vote, I went to a Territorial Defense center, and they gave me a gun. From there, I started preparing for the worst. »
“Do you know how to shoot? Go hold the position! »
Gennady Kobal thought he was ready. For years, this 47-year-old consulting firm boss has been convinced that Russia will one day go to war with Ukraine. He prepared for it by fitting out the cellar of his house in the northern suburbs of kyiv. He installed several beds and a generator for electricity, stored food and 300 liters of water. Gennadi trained in shooting and emergency medicine. “I even bought an apartment in the Carpathians, to shelter my family just in case. »
Ukrainian soldiers taking position on a bridge near the capital kyiv, the day after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. / Emilio Morenatti/AP
He didn’t expect the bombs to hit his neighborhood on the first day of the war, however. Gennadi, his wife and two children take shelter in the basement. Relatives join them, distraught. The hours pass in the anxious wait for information, and the fear of seeing the Russians enter the village. The children are crying. Gennadi does not sleep at night. Decision is made to evacuate everyone in the west of the country. The journey will begin the next day: thirty hours on the road to Ouzhhorod. Then he will join the army as a volunteer.
→ EXPLANATION. What is the neutrality that Russia wants to impose on Ukraine?
“I couldn’t just sit there and wait. Our army absolutely needed new soldiers. We had to show them that they were supported. » On his return from Ouzhhorod, a few days later, he was incorporated and sent to Zaporijjia. As soon as he got off the train, he and his comrades were sent to the front. “Our lines were cracking. No one asked questions. I was told: “Do you know how to shoot? Go hold your position!” »
Gennadi is still in the army. He will stay there as long as he feels useful. “For the moment, we are managing the emergency. When there is a ceasefire, we will look back and try to understand. It only happened a very short time. I am still in shock. »
“We will remember that we were attacked”
Vitaly Oplatchko meets in a sunny park in Odessa. At 84, he’s seen so much he could fill a library with his stories. Long captain in the Soviet merchant navy, dissident, photographer, he was the first to have founded a maritime trading company at the fall of the USSR.
On February 24, it was still dark when his eldest son called him. “Dad, the war has begun. » For hours, they devour the news, with heavy hearts. When day finally dawns, they wonder what they can do. Decision is made to help the 28e army brigade, which protects the city. He pays €3,000 to buy her medical equipment.
→ REPORTAGE.Between blockade and warning sirens, Odessa settles in the war
Finally comes a difficult decision. Go or stay? His eldest son wants to leave the city, the youngest to engage in territorial defense. Vitaly chooses to stay. “I have a wife who can barely walk, and a dog twice the size of you. I didn’t want to be a burden on my son. » He still remains in Odessa, despite the bombardments which are beginning to affect “the pearl of the Black Sea”.
We ask him what he thinks of the date of February 24. He has lived long enough to know that dates are sometimes forgotten over time. “But we will remember that we were attacked. I am proud of my people. In the past, I have sometimes underestimated our ability to unite. Today I know that the bloodshed will give birth to a new nation. »
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► A month of war
February 24. Moscow launches its military offensive in Ukraine by bombarding several localities (Kharkiv, kyiv, Mariupol, Odessa).
February 27. Vladimir Putin orders to “put on alert” the Russian nuclear deterrent force.
March 1st. Russian aircraft bomb the TV tower in kyiv.
4 mars. Russian forces seize the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, triggering a fire that is quickly brought under control.
9 mars. In Mariupol, a building housing a maternity hospital and a pediatric hospital was bombed.
13 mars. A military base located 20 km from the border with Poland is destroyed by a salvo of missiles.