At the foot of a building, Ukrainian police and soldiers move around a metal pipe. Nine floors above, the charred walls of an apartment emerge through a gaping hole.
The tube was a GRAD multiple rocket that had just hit a residential area of Kherson, a major city in southern Ukraine that lives in fear of almost daily Russian bombing raids a year after it was liberated by the Ukrainian army.
In the charred hallways of the building, 58-year-old Natalia mourns her mother, who was killed in the explosion. “We found her under this slab of stone,” she said, sobbing, pointing to a huge block of concrete with one hand and clutching her white bathrobe with the other.
Beneath his feet lie the ashes of what must have once been the kitchen, which we can see from a mix of charred pasta and melted pots.
In the apartment next door, a young woman enters the rest of her living room. Faced with the damage, she puts her hands over her mouth and then stretches them toward a religious icon that still hangs on the wall. “My God! Why did you do this to me?” she blurted out before bursting into tears.
Kherson was the first major city and only regional capital to fall into Russian hands when its invasion began in February 2022.
The port city experienced eight months of occupation before being liberated on November 11.
The scenes of joy and the soldiers’ hugs with the residents were quickly followed by bombing raids by the Russian army, which withdrew to the left bank of the Dnieper, which borders Kherson and became the front line in this area.
9,500 keystrokes
In one year, the city and its surrounding areas were hit by nearly 9,500 attacks, killing nearly 200 civilians, the regional administration told AFP. According to the NGO Doctors Without Borders, 80% of health facilities in the Kherson region have been destroyed or damaged.
Authorities estimate the current population of Kherson city at 60,000, a far cry from the 300,000 before the war.
On the facades of the city’s buildings, most of whose windows have been blown out, traces of the occupation are still visible, such as these yellow and blue ribbons – the colors of Ukraine – that were spray-painted by a resistance movement at the time.
Shopping centers on the outskirts of Kherson have been destroyed. Some businesses remain open in the center: some grocery stores, drugstores and pharmacies. The last residents who didn’t flee flock there without ever staying out in the evening.
Of the hundred stalls in the central market, only a few older people still open their stalls. “This is not recommended by the town hall, it is too dangerous,” explains Borys, the site manager.
“The young go to the front, we old people have to work,” said this 70-year-old man with a white mustache. He walks around the site, pointing out each hole made by shrapnel from a rocket that crashed two days earlier. “In this shop, a tailor suffered cardiac arrest due to the explosion. We buried him yesterday,” he explains.
“Gray City”
Borys now lives in central Kherson after leaving his home on the left bank of the Dnieper. He says he escaped on a boat at night during the occupation. “There were dozens of us on those boats. “The Russians had cut off access to the bridge,” he explains.
Since then, he has received regular messages from his neighbors who remain there. “The Russians stole everything from my house, even my car,” the old man said. “I miss my home so much.”
Everyone here has their own story about the occupation and liberation, like Olena Danyliouk, who fled the occupied city.
“The Russians were trying to mobilize young people over 18, and when our son had just had them, my husband said we had to run away, we had no choice,” says this 44-year-old woman.
In a car with the minimum of belongings, a white sheet on the window, the family had to pass through 13 Russian checkpoints. “They were all led by Chechens. But last time it was the Russians who spoke Ukrainian to trap us. But we still managed to escape, which made it seem like I was seeing my pregnant sister,” she says.
Olena returned to Kherson five days after liberation to find her home.
The return was a shock. “I noticed that my city, which is usually so colorful, has turned gray. The people were all dressed somberly. Even my friends’ children stopped smiling, they were emotionless,” she recalls.
Olena Danyliouk is now volunteering for a foundation that distributes humanitarian aid. “People need it here,” she said.