"Sometimes survival is just luck": how a Kyiv woman ended up at the centre of Russian attack on 16 April – photos

A Russian strike on Kyiv on the night of 15-16 April killed four people, including an 11-year-old boy. Dozens were injured. Among those caught in the attack was Viktoriia, who survived the blast in her apartment.

Source: Viktoriia in a comment to Ukrainska Pravda. Zhyttia (Life)

Details: Viktoriia's apartment ended up in the epicentre of the strike. The explosion jammed her front door, and she hid in the bathroom.

For Ukrainska Pravda. Zhyttia, she spoke about what she went through that night and the aftermath of the attack.

Viktoriia said she woke up to the sound of an air-raid warning at 02:31, and a few minutes later saw a bright orange flash in the sky.

She was sleeping almost right by the window, so a large amount of debris of various sizes flew onto her bed.

"It felt like watching a 3D film: from a bright background, shards of glass were flying towards you at high speed after a powerful blast," she recalls. "I remember feeling a burning sensation on my face and arm. I was probably shielding myself from the wave of hot air."

Viktoriia then ran to the front door, but the impact was so strong that the lock jammed. She tried to open it but could not. She was trapped inside the apartment and feared she would not be able to escape if a fire broke out.

Until the all-clear was given, Viktoriia remained in the bathroom – the room that was almost untouched by the blast. Emergency services were only able to open the door at around 09:00.

Viktoriia says: "The scariest thing in this situation is the realisation that sometimes surviving a strike is just luck. I survived while being in the centre of the strike. But my apartment is heavily damaged – wallpaper torn off, windows shattered, belongings cut by shrapnel.

Theoretically, if I had run to the shelter immediately after the air-raid warning was issued, I would have been caught by the blast in the stairwell. And there, all the doors and windows were blown out and were flying at high speed. The ground floor of the building was also destroyed: if someone had been there at that moment, they would probably not have made it out. The epicentre of the explosion was very close."

Now the entire facade of the building is covered in damage from large pieces of shrapnel, with craters outside, and it is dangerous to walk nearby due to the risk of collapsing glass and balcony structures.

"I now have sleep problems," she says. "That bright flash keeps coming back in my memory, followed by a loud explosion. I can almost hear my own scream from outside.

Night now feels like danger, so it's very hard to relax or fall asleep. It feels like I have to stay constantly alert, ready to react."

In the building where Viktoriia lives, two people were killed – a 35-year-old woman and an 11-year-old boy named Maksym. The boy was asleep during the attack when he was killed in his own bed.

Maksym was a fifth-grade student. He is survived by his older brother, parents and grandparents.

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