Mountains of discarded clothes and other personal effects are strewn along the corridors leading out of Ukraine. The farther people carry their things, the harder it is, so they leave them, says Lyudmila Sokol, a physical education teacher who fled Zaporozhye south.
But they keep their pets close to them.
PHOTO: Dogs and cats among Ukrainian refugees
Everywhere, among the exodus of more than 2.5 million refugees fleeing the Russian invasion, there are pets that people could not leave behind: birds, rabbits, hamsters, cats and dogs.
People fleeing from the outskirts of Kyiv crowded under the destroyed bridge, carrying small luggage and leaving cars on the road. But their pets stayed with them.
One woman ferried her dog across a makeshift bridge across the Irpin River during the evacuation. Another at a railway station in Poland snuggled nose to nose against his ginger cat.
A young girl wrapped in an aluminized blanket hugged her two chihuahuas tightly as she drove to Medyka, Poland.
And in Siret, Romania, a young mother helped her baby drink from a paper cup while hugging her white Chihuahua. Nearby, a Maltese puppy peeked out of a plastic bag filled with toothpaste, shampoo and hand lotion.
Grabbing her fluffy white dog, the elderly woman who made it to Romania collapsed exhausted in a ballroom converted into a refugee shelter.
Hundreds of thousands of displaced people are also inside Ukraine, fleeing attacks on their hometowns. An 84-year-old woman who identified herself only by her first name, Antonina, sat in a wheelchair at a sorting station in Kyiv, holding a miniature poodle in her arms and clutching the leashes of 11 of her dogs after being evacuated from the city of Irpin.
Victoria Trofimenko said that she feels obliged to ensure the safety of not only her family, but also her pets.
The 42-year-old never originally planned to leave Kyiv, she told The Associated Press via Zoom days after the war broke out.
But as the rockets and explosives rained down, she thought about her duty to protect her 18-year-old daughter, her 69-year-old mother, as well as her dog Akira and cat Galileo.
She bought train tickets to travel west, eventually ending up in Prague. She said that it was her first time coming to Hungary and she was grateful that Akira was by her side for protection.
“I can’t leave dogs or cats. I have to take responsibility,” she said.
MORE: Russia-Ukraine Live Updates
The video in the media player above was used in a previous report.
© 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.