Three stories about the war. Yuliia ‘Cuba’ Sidorova

Is there a place for coincidences in war? How can small details change fate?

We continue to tell funny and not-so-funny stories from the frontline from our defenders.

This time, Yuliia Sidorova, our sworn sister and paramedic with the 4th Assault Battalion of the 92nd Brigade, tells us three stories about fate and coincidences at the front. About a house on fire, three wheels and Birthday.

Story about the house on fire

At the beginning of this year, an enemy drone hit our location in Kharkiv region, the house where we were living at that time, and the house caught fire. We ran outside, and the guys were trying to save some of our belongings and munitions from the burning house. I was standing with Alaska outside the house and realised that there was a big oxygen cylinder inside. I think, “Arse”. If it explodes there now, the arrival of the drone will seem like flowers compared to that explosion. I told Alaska about it and ran into the house. It was scary. Very scary. Everything was on fire, but I knew I had to get the cylinder out in time. It was on a stand with wheels — I grabbed it and ran back. I ran outside, and the guys were already carrying Alaska in their arms — while I was taking the cylinder, a second drone flew to the place where we were standing and she was wounded. So I was saved by running into a burning building, which seemed much more dangerous than standing outside at the time. Such a coincidence.

Story about three wheels 

This story happened recently.  We had a call for picking up a 300. Usually we try not to go to the Bakhmut direction in the daylight, because it is dangerous. But then it coincided that it was already dawn and we had to take out the soldiers who had been blown up on ‘butterflies’. One of the guys had a partially amputated limb and he was just crawling across the field so we could pick him up.

We left in the daylight and managed to pick up the wounded, but on the way we were immediately shelled by the enemy. Shrapnel hit our vehicle and punctured a wheel. And then we went with the wounded 26 km more under fire, on three wheels. And we made it) 

As it turned out, this is quite possible if you really need it.

Story about Birthday

Back in 2016, when I was in the Hospitallers, our group commander was Mangust. In the place where we lived, in the neighbouring yard, one of the soldiers had Birthday, and Mangust told me, “We have to go”. And I really didn’t want to go there, so I said, “What kind of birthday party is there in the war? I’m not going”. And Mangust replied, “You’ll tell your mum at home that you’re not going anywhere. But here I told you to go, so you have to go.”

I thought that, if it was so important, I’d go. And as soon as we went out into the neighbouring yard, it hit our yard. Two cars parked on the street and the kitchen in the house where we usually had dinner were heavily damaged by the shrapnel. Shrapnel hit the whole place near the sofa, right at the level of my head. That is, if we had not gone to that birthday party, we would have been sitting on that sofa. Such a coincidence. 

Editor Marysia Mianovska