‘Nobody Will Evacuate These Poor People’
A 28-year-old Ukrainian medic, Helena Popova, traveled from Lutsk to Kherson last Friday to help victims of the flood caused by the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam. She went “just to stay sane,” she told me. Across the Dnipro River, in her hometown of Oleshky, thousands of people, including her parents, younger sister, and grandfather, urgently needed food, evacuation, and medical attention.
There Oleshky was, less than 10 miles away from her, across an expanse of river and floodwater. The Dnipro was the front line, and Oleshky sat on the Russian-controlled side. When Ukrainian boats tried to ferry help from the right bank to the left, the Russians opened fire. After a day of work in the Ukrainian-controlled area, Popova was soaking wet in her shorts and T-shirt.
