August 1st, 2024
63,450 people evacuated from danger to date
183 people evacuated from danger this week
37 trips into deoccupied and frontline territories this week
Drones and artillery continue to pound Ukraine. This morning 90 drones attempted to attack Kyiv in the biggest drone attack to date. All of the drones were destroyed, but people in Kyiv didn’t get much sleep. The situation is more dire in frontline regions, where most of Russia’s fire power is concentrated. Ukraine experiences 90 airstrikes and more than 4,000 artillery bombardments daily. Yet these brutal attacks do not deter our volunteers, who are able to continue helping people at the same rate as ever. Our teams give direct aid to nearly 20,000 people each week, and additional indirect aid to 20,000 more, via water and cargo deliveries, which the teams managed to increase in the last two weeks.
Stories
Tragedy Strikes Our Volunteer Bohdan in Zhytomyr
Our long-time friend Bohdan runs Vse robymo sami (We Do Everything Ourselves) — a Zhytomyr nonprofit helping hundreds of internally displaced (IDP) children and children with disabilities. An orphan himself, Bohdan has had to raise his siblings. He knows firsthand the experiences of children dealing with heartbreak and hardship.
Last week, a tragedy struck Bohdan’s own family again. When the power came back on after a scheduled blackout, a power surge caused an electrical fire in his home. Bohdan's house burned down to the ground, with only three walls remaining. All belongings and documents were destroyed. Fortunately, Bohdan, his sisters, and their children were able to escape. For now, Bohdan is living in his office, and friends have taken in his sisters, nieces and nephews. Our US team is keeping in touch with Bohdan and is ready to help him in whatever way we can. Supporting our Ukrainian volunteers is an important part of our mission, though our primary focus remains on enabling them to assist others.
Snapshot of Evacuation from Toretsk
Last week, the Dobra Sprava (Good Deeds) team performed an evacuation from Toretsk. A 65 year-old woman named Valentyna, sitting behind the volunteer driver Volodymyr, was crying continuously. After leaving the danger zone, she calmed down a bit and opened up about her story.
Valentyna had lived in Toretsk all her life. After her husband's death eight years ago, she started raising goats to make a living. On the morning of the evacuation, a bomb destroyed her house and partially destroyed her barn. In a panic, knowing she had to flee, Valentyna untied her goats, some of whom were injured. Then, leaving her barn door open, she took a bag of documents and rushed to the city center. An armored rescue vehicle picked her up and took her to the evacuation point where she boarded the minibus to Dnipro with other residents. Valentyna was one of 176 people Ihor and his team evacuated last week.
Auto Shop Evacuation in Bohuslavka
Recently, Vitaliy's team from Kharkiv carried out a large-scale evacuation from the village of Bohuslavka, Izyum District, Kharkiv Region. A man and his family ran the best auto service station in the village, repairing both military and civilian automobiles. Enemy intelligence spotted a cluster of army vehicles and sent a guided aerial bomb, which destroyed several houses in a row, leaving the service station owners with no home and no safe place to stay. The volunteers evacuated the family in two minibuses, together with all their animals and five tons of shop equipment and household items.
Royal Academy of Architecture Dorfman Prize
Our longtime partner, Livyj bereh (Left Bank) made the shortlist of nominees for the prestigious Royal Academy of Architecture Dorfman Prize. The team was nominated for their work on restoring roofs in the Kharkiv Region. A statement from the jury commended Lyvyi beheh: “Their work embodies a gesture that gives hope to the people who live in these areas. To provide architecture that defies the destruction of neighborhoods, especially in a moment that is about erasure, is of deep importance.”
Aid In Occupied Territories
Four people were evacuated this week from the Russian-occupied left bank and 70 people occupied towns received help.
Team Summaries
Alina’s Team – Dobra sprava (Good Deeds)
18 trips, evacuating 176 people from Lyman, Mykolaiv, Kostyantynivka, Toretsk, Novohrodivka, Kurakhove, Myrnohrad, Selydove and Pokrovsk areas.
Inna’s Team – Krok z nadiyeyu (Step with Hope)
8,100 people received 21.1 tons of aid.
9,500 people received bread.
Kherson Operations:
Exterminations in 19 buildings.
16 equipment maintenance tasks performed.
Aid delivered to Kramatorsk, Sloviansk, Nikopol, and Aleksandropol.
Oleksandr D’s Volunteer Networks
Vladyslav K (Mykolaiv): delivered 42 tons of drinking water to Mykolaiv and 14 tons of water to Kherson.
Andriy P (Mykolaiv): brought an ambulance and two pickup trucks from Germany to Kherson. The vehicles were loaded with 1,400 kg of aid, including adult diapers, catheters, food, thermoses, hygiene items, animal feed, sleeping bags, tents, bedding, tires, and 8 gifts to be sent to private addresses in Ukraine. Took 18 tons of clothing and shoes from the Hands of Mercy fund to the internally displaced (IDP) assistance center in Kramatorsk.
Sandra S (Odesa): kitchen fed more than 800 people.
Vitaliy Z (Kharkiv): delivered 3 tons of clothes, medicine, aid packages and animal feed to Oleksiievo-Druzhkivka (Donetsk Region) and 3 tons of aid to the area near Kupiansk (Kharkiv Region). In Oleksiievo-Druzhkivka, as a result of an aerial attack that hit a military depot, an entire street burned down, killing some people and leaving others without homes and possessions. Carried out a large-scale evacuation of a family from Bohuslavka, near Izium (Kharkiv Region), along with their animals and 5 tons of household items and equipment from their service station.
Oleksandr D (Lutsk): Brought 400 kg of energy bars and muesli to Inna’s Krok z nadiyeyu (Step with Hope) team in Dnipro. Delivered honey, equipment from the BIOTRONIK plant in Berlin, painkillers and antibiotics from Italy to the VitoCenter hospital in Zaporizhzhia and 200 kg of sweets from Germany, rice and soy to an IDP support center there. Met with manufacturers of fuel briquettes in Zaporizhzhia and Dnipro to discuss production challenges given the unstable situation with electricity.
Oleksandr Z (Lutsk): provided therapeutic interventions for internally displaced (IDP) children, children with disabilities, and children from military families:
Offered art therapy to 40 children and their parents (total of 2 art therapy sessions held).
Visited a museum with 43 children.
Brought additional equipment for the psychotherapy room and treated 28 children there.
Helped 68 people with clothes and shoes.
Distributed bread and other groceries to 240 IDPs.
Kseniia’s Team – Livyj bereh (Left Bank)
Kherson based team reported numbers for two weeks:
133 families helped in Kherson: 78 disabled elderly, and 55 low-income families with children.
75 people helped in Oleksandrivka.
Karina’s Team – My ryatuyemo Ukrayinu (We Save Ukraine)
97 people in the shelter.
Replaced pillows in the shelter.
Timur’s Team – Komanda Teymura Alyeva (Timur Alyev’s Team)
Distributed aid to 276 people in Saltivka, Kharkiv Region.
Delivered aid to 200 people in the hard-hit Kivsharivka, Kupiansk areas.
Special deliveries to 40 families with babies and 36 disabled elderly.
Helped put out a fire in a village near Kharkiv that started from a Russian shelling.
Pavel and Olena’s Teams – Dotyk sertsya (Touch of Heart) & Svitanok mriy (Dawn of Dreams)
1467 people received help through the Mykolaiv office.
205 packages delivered to Kobzartsi.
3 tons of water delivered to Novohryhorivka.
125 families received aid (clothing and toys for children) in Mykolaiv.
Pomahaem Foundation (We Help Foundation)
21 tons of water delivered to Nikopol, doubling previous week’s volume.
209 packages distributed in Shyroke near Mykolaiv.
259 packages delivered to Vesele near Izyum.
Marina’s Team – Daruy dobro Ukrayina (Give Good Ukraine)
150 packages distributed in Piatyhatky.
Dina’s Team – Vilʹni lyudy, vilʹna krayina (Free People, Free Country)
Distributed 610 packages of grocery and hygiene humanitarian aid in Dnipro, Kremenchuk, Kanev, Krasnokutsk, and Poltava.
Mailed 100 packages of aid to people in far removed towns.
Serhiy T traveled to Mykolaivka and delivered 65 packages of aid and pet food to the 65 people who still remain there, 20-30 km from the frontline.
Bohdan’s Team – Vse robymo sami (We Do Everything Ourselves)
43 families received food and hygiene kits in Zhytomyr.
At club for children with disabilities children continue to learn to cook and play psychological relief games.
How to Help
Donate — The money goes directly to teams providing aid on the ground, who respond dynamically to the most urgent needs.
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Fill out this form if you’re interested in volunteering with us, and we’ll let you know when opportunities come up.
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