When the damp concrete walls deep underground, the mold, the cold and the weeks without fresh fruits and vegetables became too much, some in the bunker under Elina Tsibulchenko’s office decided to visit the sky.
They made their way through the darkness lit by flashlights and rechargeable lamps to a valuable site at the bombed Azovstal steel plant, the last Ukrainian holder in the ruined city of Mariupol. There they could look up and see a piece of blue or smoky gray. It was like peeking from the bottom of a well. For those who could not or did not dare to ascend to the surface, it was as far away as peace.
But seeing the sky meant hope. It was enough to make Elina’s eldest daughter, Tatiana, cry.
Smoke rises from the Azovstal plant in Mariupol on Thursday. The evacuees, hidden in a maze of underground bunkers, had little or no communication with those elsewhere in the plant. (Associated Press)
The Tsibulchenko family were among the first to leave the steel plant during a tense, days-long evacuation agreed by the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) with the governments of Russia, which now controls Mariupol, and Ukraine, which wants the city back.
Hundreds of civilians have fled the steel plant in the past week, although renewed attacks continue to disrupt evacuation efforts.
The Tsibulchenko family arrived safely in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporozhye this week. There, they described to the Associated Press their two months in the center of hell and their escape.
“We didn’t even take toothbrushes”
Hundreds of civilian and Ukrainian fighters remain trapped at the plant, and Russian forces have made their way inside. The conquest of Mariupol is expected to play a central role in celebrating Moscow on May 9, Victory Day, historically marking the end of World War II.
In the first days of the Russian invasion, 54-year-old Tsibulchenko was shocked by the bombing of her city. Like many residents with memories of civil defense scientists, she knew that the steel plant had the only real bunkers in the city. When she, her husband Sergei, her daughter and son-in-law Igor Trotsak decided to hide in the office under her office, she assumed they would stay for a few days.
“We didn’t even get toothbrushes,” Elina said. But a few days turned into 60.
They had brought only their documents, three blankets, two dogs and fruit, carried in a basket they used for Orthodox Easter. They didn’t think they would celebrate the holiday there weeks later.
Members of the Tsibulchenko family are eating with other people after arriving from the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, a center for displaced people in Zaporozhye, Ukraine, on Tuesday. (Eugene Maloletka / Associated Press)
The steel plant has a maze of more than 30 bunkers and tunnels spanning 11 square kilometers, each with its own world. The evacuees had little or no communication with those elsewhere in the plant, although they would eventually meet on the evacuation buses to Zaporozhye and compare experiences.
Their isolation complicates estimates of the number of remaining civilian and Ukrainian fighters. Several hundred civilians are still trapped, the Ukrainian side said this week, including more than 20 children. Another evacuation reportedly began on Friday.
The number of underground survivors threatens to decline every day. Some evacuees recall watching in horror how the wounded succumbed to their injuries while first aid supplies, even clean water, were depleted or run out.
“People are literally rotting like our jackets,” said 31-year-old Sergei Kuzmenko. The tired foreman at the factory escaped with his wife, 8-year-old daughter and four others from their bunker; 30 were abandoned. “They are in great need of our help,” he said. “We have to get them out.”
Hasty funeral for a favorite pet
In another bunker, the Tsibulchenko family lived among 56 people, including 14 children aged 4 to 17. They survived by dividing among themselves the naked rations that the fighters took down – canned meat, oatmeal, biscuits, salt, sugar, water. There was not enough to go around.
The family’s old cocker spaniel was suffering, trembling and staring at them. The dog had to die, they decided. It was an act of mercy. They asked a soldier for sleeping pills, but he said the dog could survive and suffer more.
“Let me film it,” he said.
The dog was hastily buried above the ground in the midst of the shelling; Debris and scrap were placed on top of it to protect it from other starving pets.
There was little comfort. The bunker shook from the bombing. Every night we went to bed like that and thought, “Are we going to survive?” Elina said.
In this print photo, taken from a video published on Wednesday by the press service of the Ministry of Interior of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, smoke is rising from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol. The Donetsk People’s Republic is a breakaway state created by pro-Russian separatists in 2014 (Press Service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Donetsk People’s Republic / Associated Press)
Celebrate Easter in a damp, moldy bunker
The Tsibulchenko family and others slept on benches lined with the uniforms of steelworks workers. They used buckets for toilets. When the bombing became too heavy to empty the buckets upstairs, they used plastic bags. To spend their time, people invented board games or played cards. A cut pieces of wood into toys.
A room in the bunker has become a playground. People found markers and paper and held a competition for arts and crafts, with the children drawing what they would like to see the most. They painted nature and the sun. As Easter approached in late April, they painted Easter eggs and bunnies.
The drawings were placed on walls dripping with moisture. Smelling of damp mold creeps from the corners and migrates to clothes and blankets. The only way to keep something dry was to wear it. Even after the evacuation and after his first suitable showers in months, Tsibulchenko was worried they smelled of mold.
Elina Tsibulchenko keeps pieces of an Easter basket, which the family brought with fruit to the Azovstal steel plant. When they entered the bunker two months ago, they thought they would only stay a few days. (Francisco Seco / Associated Press)
While trying to collect rainwater, they often used disinfectant to clean themselves and their dishes, to the extent that Elin’s hands showed an allergic reaction. In the early days, she went up to her office and brought lotion, deodorant, and several other personal items she had left there.
Then it became too dangerous to go upstairs. Half of the building, including its office, collapsed during the bombing.
Over and over again in the two months, the people in the bunker would hear about possible evacuations from Mariupol, only to learn that they had failed. There was skepticism and fear when news of the UN-agreed evacuation arrived. But planning began with deciding who to leave first.
WATCH Trapped residents leave Azovstal steel plant:
Trapped residents leave Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, Ukraine
About 100 people, most of whom were caught underground at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, Ukraine, have left through a safe corridor. 0:58
Others said Tsibulchenko should leave because Elina’s tight legs began to turn black and cause her problems. “But there are small children here and they have to go,” she said.
The others insisted. They assumed that the evacuation would continue in the coming days and would take everyone, even the fighters. Some hesitated to see if the first evacuation was successful.
A little girl left behind, Violeta, took a marker and drew a flower, a heart and “Success” on Elina’s hand. The residents of the bunker had abbreviated the girl’s name to Leta, or “sunlight.”
‘We are very sorry’
Everyone in the bunker agreed to meet to celebrate in a cafe in Zaporozhye when the evacuation was over.
“We are very sorry,” Tsibulchenko told the others as they walked to the surface.
“Don’t worry,” they replied. – We will follow.
Elina did not recognize her workshop. The roof was removed. The walls were in ruins. The ground was littered with craters and littered with unexploded ordnance.
As they emerged from a hole in the rubble, the family and other evacuees blinked. Two months later, the sunlight hurt their eyes.
It was quiet. The Russian bombing stopped for once.
People are eating after arriving from Mariupol at a center for displaced people in Zaporizhia, Ukraine, on Tuesday. (Eugene Maloletka) / Associated Press
“The weather was brilliant,” said Ivan Bochorishvili, deputy head of the UN’s humanitarian services in Ukraine, who approached the plant to greet the evacuees. “The one when you’re waiting for the perfect storm, like the blue sky.”
A dangerous section is ahead. A railway bridge near the plant was the reception point for evacuees. The waiting buses were a mile away.
For the evacuation, the Russians tried to retrieve the mines they had planted. But the machine did not find everything, Bochorishvili said.
As he and a colleague approached in their car, the Russians shouted hundreds of meters away, “Don’t move!” UN workers were told to get out and return carefully to the last checkpoint on foot. The demining machine was brought back. Eight more mines have been discovered.
Ukrainian soldiers were marching forward and behind the evacuees when they finally showed up, making sure the convoy of people had set their feet safely.
“Thank God we didn’t see bodies on the way,” Elina said. The Russians had removed them.
Leave the bunker to discover a city of graves
Twenty-one people showed up the first day. The others went out to the next one. When the second group met the first, “there were all these hugs and kisses. They were in Azovstal, but they had not seen each other, they did not know what happened to everyone …
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