'No one wants to risk getting trapped': In war, dangers multiply for Ukraine's miners
TORETSK, Ukraine — When a 155-millimeter rocket plows into the ground and you're 2,000 feet under it, you hear nothing — you barely even feel it. Which was why Andriy Podhornay was surprised when his manager came on the walkie-talkie and told the crew in the bowels of the St. Matrona Moskovskaya mine that a Russian artillery strike had just hit. They started moving — fast.
"We were eating when he called us. We immediately went up," said Podhornay, a wiry 32-year-old with a weathered face.
"No one wants to risk getting trapped down there."
When he got to the surface, he found the elevator tower wreathed in black smoke and a large crater right behind it. He quickly joined the others to inspect for damage, taking a moment to pick up shell fragments.
The attack last week was the first to strike the mine's compound, but hardly the first to Toretsk, a city with a prewar population of some 32,000, is only a few miles from the so-called contact line,a year earlier. The town has been a frequent target.
