«росіяни почали тут бушувати». Битва за Межову на Дніпропетровщині / hromadske

At dusk in Mezhova, a settlement in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region, a house is burning, its roof on the verge of collapse. Fiber-optic cables glisten across vegetable gardens. Every ten minutes, the sound of a drone cuts through the air. Most of the UAVs are Ukrainian, but you can never be completely sure. Mezhova is now in the kill zone — just 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the front line. The settlement once served as a logistics hub for Ukrainian forces defending the Dnipropetrovsk region. Now, the front is moving closer. Before the full-scale invasion, more than 7,000 people lived here. Today, locals say only a few hundred remain. According to the village council, just over 400 residents are still in Mezhova. One of them is Oleh Ptytsia. He stayed behind even though his wife, daughter, and granddaughter evacuated to Odesa. As we record an interview, the sound of a drone echoes overhead. At first, he takes cover in an outbuilding in his yard, then steps back outside, saying, “Ours, ours.” Despite several drones passing over his house during the ten minutes we speak, he has no plans to leave yet. “They’re burning down houses — fighting against houses. If we have to, we’ll leave. But abandoning everything we’ve built over the years… We’ll do something when it becomes unbearable,” says Ptytsia. Mezhova used to be a rear-area base for soldiers of the 108th Separate Assault Battalion, the Da Vinci Wolves. Here they would transfer into armored vehicles before heading toward the front. Six months ago, Mezhova itself became part of the battlefield. “This job has worn me out — everyone here wants to kill me,” jokes a drone operator with the call sign Teplyi as an explosion echoes above the basement where he is stationed. russian forces are systematically destroying buildings so they cannot be used as shelter by Ukrainian troops. “Guided aerial bombs started hitting the area heavily. People began leaving. We started looking for positions. Then the russians moved their drone pilots closer, and that’s when there was a huge increase in activity from Molniya drones and FPVs,” says Dubok, an FPV pilot with the Da Vinci Wolves battalion. Now the Da Vinci Wolves enter Mezhova only in armored vehicles and only during bad weather. Ordinary pickup trucks are out of the question — enemy drones constantly monitor the roads. Despite the fact that russian drones have made logistics to Mezhova extremely difficult, enemy assault groups have not been attacking as aggressively this summer as they could during the season of dense foliage. “The russians are advancing in our direction. They move through the tree lines from their positions one or two at a time, trying to establish footholds. Very few make it through,” says Husky, an FPV pilot with the Vovcha Bartka unit. As he speaks, he is flying a drone toward a wounded russian soldier near a tree line and, as if to prove his point, finishes the attack. What is it like to live in a kill zone? And what does the battle for Mezhova look like today? Watch the report by Diana Butsko and Vladyslav Safronov. This report was produced with the support of the International Fund for Journalists’ Insurance project, implemented by the Association of Independent Regional Publishers of Ukraine. The project is part of the Voices of Ukraine / SAFE program, coordinated by the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom. Voices of Ukraine / SAFE is implemented within the Hannah Arendt Initiative and supported by the German Federal Foreign Office. Friends, if you share the values ​​of hromadske and want to join our community, follow the link and choose your subscription level: https://cutt.ly/KrUlgtju You can also donate to hromadske bank in Monobank: https://cutt.ly/urUlfW43 Become a sponsor of this channel to receive bonuses:    / @hromadske_ua   Subscribe to us so you don't miss the main news from Ukraine and the world: ➡️ https://goo.gl/Vt2i4n We at hromadske do not stop our work during the war. Our journalists and editors are currently working in the eastern and western regions, from makeshift offices, shelters and basements, because our weapon is the truth. Journalists and editors at hromadske work relentlessly in each region of our war-disrupted country. We continue to work from improvised offices, shelters, and bunkers. We do so, because the truth is our weapon, too. Friends, if you share the values ​​of hromadske and have already finished the Armed Forces of Ukraine, you can support us: https://cutt.ly/KrUlgtju Hromadske website: https://hromadske.ua/ We are on social networks: Facebook: https://fb.com/hromadskeua Twitter:   / hromadskeua   Telegram: https://t.me/hromadske_ua Instagram:   / hromadske.ua   TikTok:   / hromadske.ua   Threads: https://www.threads.com/@hromadske.ua #hromadske