In Dnipro, a crowd of Ukrainian refugees is waiting for a train
Waiting, haste, goodbye… Thousands of people gathered at the Dneprovsky railway station in central Ukraine to try to catch a train west and escape Russian bombardments.
Residents say they don’t want to wait for Dnipro to become “the next Kharkiv,” Ukraine’s second-largest city in the northeast, close to the Russian border, and the scene of the heaviest shelling since the start of the war.
Men of military age, between 18 and 60, cannot leave Ukraine, but many came to say goodbye to their wives, mothers, and children when they left. “We send our wives and children to Lvov, maybe further, but we stay here. We try to keep a positive attitude, but the situation is dire,” describes Andrei Kirichenko, 40, a bricklayer from Kharkiv.
The station staff said they had no information about when the trains arrive or where they go, although most passengers planned to go to Lviv.
“I don’t care where my family ends up, as long as it’s far from Kharkiv,” said driver Nikola Kirichenko, 44, who plans to return to Kharkiv as soon as his relatives board the train. His elderly parents, unable to move, stayed there.
Faced with a mass of commuters rushing to leave the city, the municipality announced it would install a special barrier to keep out the crowds in a press release on Telegram messages. Mayor Boris Filatov also urged men who came to say goodbye to their families to stay away from the docks.
People try to board a train at the Dnipro train station on March 5, 2022. EMRE CHAYLAK / AFP