What do you take with you when your town is burning? A dispatch from Ukraine 1843mag
n her right hand a woman is holding up a stick with a piece of white cloth attached to it. A dozen people hurry along after her, including three small children, and a spaniel. Behind them, huge columns of black smoke billow from the town of Bucha, where thousands of people have spent the past week hiding in shelters or basements. This satellite town, 20 miles north-west of Kyiv, is now a frontline in the war as Russia closes in.
Once they have passed through the makeshift blockade at the town’s entrance, the Ukrainians have a short walk past a garage where a yellow Porsche sits, abandoned mid-repair when the invasion began. Behind a shell-damaged building, vans and cars draw up to drive the civilians through the empty streets of Irpin to get them to the bridge out of town. There they will be rescued by another convoy and taken to buses that will take them to Kyiv.
Refugees need to cross the town to get to Kyiv. Once out of Irpin, the road runs straight to the municipal boundary of Kyiv, but first each person must cross the bridge leading over the Irpin river. In wartime this is no simple journey. Soon after the invasion began on February 24th, Ukrainian forces blew up the bridge over the river to slow any Russian advance.
For days this bridge has been the site of an extraordinary drama, as thousands of desperate people have crossed. The passage has become more orderly and organised, but many people, particularly the elderly or those in wheelchairs, have had to be carried on the backs of others or on makeshift stretchers.
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