As Serhiy Ostapenko hunkered down in his pickup truck, hiding under trees for cover in the dead of night, the crashing booms of Russian bombardment rumbled around him. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe enemy is shelling us 24 hours a day. I don\u2019t remember the last time there was silence for more than an hour,\u201d said the 32-year-old Ukrainian drone pilot, speaking from the right bank of the Dnipro River in southern Ukraine \u2013 one of the new frontlines in a grinding war that\u2019s now entering its second winter. <\/p>\n
Ostapenko is a member of the \u201cSons of Thunder\u201d drone unit, part of Ukraine\u2019s operation to cross the Dnipro, pushing back Russian forces and establishing a sustained presence on the left bank. Earlier this month, Ukraine said it had \u201cgained a foothold\u201d on the bank, a potentially significant advance in what has so far been a lackluster counteroffensive. <\/p>\n
The 2,200\u00a0kilometer (1,400\u00a0mile) long Dnipro is Europe\u2019s fourth longest river, flowing from Russia, through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. <\/p>\n
It winds through the marshlands of Russian-occupied Kherson region \u2013 with Russian troops forced to retreat across the river last November after being pushed out from Kherson city by Ukrainian fighters. <\/p>\n
The liberation of the city, after eight months of brutal occupation, was a euphoric victory and a key moment in Ukraine\u2019s war effort. But the year since has brought little relief, with Kherson city and its surrounding region still under relentless bombardment by Russian forces across the river. <\/p>\n
The Dnipro, which at some points stretches a mile wide, serves as a natural defensive barrier for Russian troops \u2013 which is partly why it has become a major target for Kyiv. Ukrainian forces have previously staged cross-river raids, but establishing a firm bridgehead across the river and pushing back the Russians could help better protect Kherson city by putting more distance between civilians and enemy artillery. <\/p>\n
And \u2013 at least theoretically \u2013 an advance on the left bank could\u00a0give\u00a0Kyiv a launching place to push further south toward occupied Crimea, the peninsula Russia illegally annexed in 2014. <\/p>\n
Ukrainian armed forces say they\u2019ve pushed back Russian troops 3 to 8 kilometers (2 to 5 miles) back from the river. <\/p>\n
\u201cNow our (troops) are advancing on the other side of the Dnipro. It is very difficult, we are making a lot of effort to make it possible and to build up our strength on the other side of the Dnipro,\u201d said Ostapenko. <\/p>\n
He added that \u201ccertain connections\u201d had been established across the river, allowing Ukrainian troops to transport \u201cweapons, ammunition, food, fuel\u201d to their partners \u201con the other side.\u201d <\/p>\n
His aerial reconnaissance unit, meanwhile, works to provide cover for soldiers crossing the river, to surveil Russian troops and movements, and to help mask the locations of Ukrainian troops and equipment. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s dangerous work; Ostapenko described facing a daily barrage of \u201ckamikaze drones, I think it\u2019s Shaheds, rockets, most likely Grad rocket launcher, mortars, and tanks.\u201d <\/p>\n
But, he added, the bombardment could be seen as a good sign: \u201cThe enemy is trying to resist as much as possible, which indicates that we are doing everything right. We are causing them many problems, and\u00a0(they are)\u00a0trying to fight it.\u201d <\/p>\n
All the while, in Kherson city, the jubilation of last year\u2019s liberation has faded for some residents as they focus on just getting through each day. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen it is quiet, it is even scarier than when there is shelling,\u201d said 54-year-old Inna Balyoha. \u201cYou\u2019re waiting, you\u2019re constantly listening, turning the radio down. So that you can hear the sounds outside the window, so that you can react in time to the shelling.\u201d <\/p>\n
She\u2019s one of roughly 73,000 residents still in Kherson \u2013 less than a quarter of its original population of 300,000. Between having to care for her 4-year-old grandson and frail 87-year-old mother, \u201cthe decision not to leave was made a long time ago,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
But living in the midst of war has taken its toll. One of her grandson\u2019s first words was \u201calarm,\u201d she said. \u201cHe knows how to react if there is an air raid siren. He knows where to go. If explosions are heard outside the window, he has a little hiding place in the hallway.\u201d <\/p>\n
The shelling has gotten so bad that they\u2019ve stopped going outside for short walks, mostly staying at home now. \u201cRight now, I\u2019m doing everything that depends on me to keep the child safe,\u201d she said. \u201cOur main task is to survive. That was the main task during the occupation. And it is now. We have to survive.\u201d <\/p>\n
Attacks on Kherson have intensified in the past month, at one point reaching 700 incoming rounds in one day, according to Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of Kherson region\u2019s military administration. <\/p>\n
Russian troops are \u201chitting residential areas more often because our defenders are advancing, and they are trying to intimidate ordinary citizens in places close to the Dnipro River,\u201d said Prokudin. \u201cThis is revenge, and now it is felt more, because our soldiers are already on the left bank of the Kherson region. The civilians of the Kherson region feel this revenge more.\u201d <\/p>\n
But, he added, each Kherson resident was an \u201cexample of courage.\u201d As tough as conditions are, Kherson is still free from Russian occupation \u2013 meaning people can \u201ccommunicate freely, walk freely on our land,\u201d he said. \u201cHome gives people strength. They are holding on because they are at home.\u201d <\/p>\n\n
As Serhiy Ostapenko hunkered down in his pickup truck, hiding under trees for cover in the dead of night, the crashing booms of Russian bombardment rumbled around him. \u201cThe enemy is shelling us 24 hours a day. I don\u2019t remember the last time there was silence for more than an hour,\u201d said the 32-year-old Ukrainian <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":12048,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-12047","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}