Oleksandr Kolychev, special correspondent with Ukraine’s international broadcasting channel Freedom TV who was wounded in a Russian drone strike on 23 October, spent nearly four full days connected to a ventilator. He had five surgeries and received 3 liters of blood transfusions, as reported in a Facebook post by Serhiy Ryzhenko, director general of the I.I. Mechnykov Clinical Hospital of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. Ryzhenko posted a clip talking to the journalist.
He says that Oleksandr Kolychev’s injuries were “hardly compatible with life.”
Serhiy Ryzhenko added that the correspondent was having daily meetings with a therapist.
“Everything is getting better. He only ever thinks of his wife and children. He no longer thinks about the pain,” Serhiy Ryzhenko said.
The journalist is currently receiving treatment in Dnipro. The strike left him with an explosive injury, multiple shrapnel wounds to the head and body, an open bone fracture and burns. He survived a coma and a complex operation.
“The condition was very serious, on the verge between life and death. But there are cases that surprise you: some people not only survive such injuries, but also recover in good cheer. You are one of them,” Serhiy Ryzhenko told the correspondent.
Oleksandr Kolychev, in turn, said that the Russians had targeted the car the camera crew was driving with a drone. He does not rule out that the occupiers did this on purpose.
“It was a Lancet targeting us. Most likely, it was lying in wait – we were its target. I remember being thrown away by the blast wave and being given first aid,” said Oleksandr Kolychev.
Freedom TV camera crew attack
As reported earlier, war reporter Alyona Hramova (Hubanova) and cameraman Yevhen Karmazin of the Ukrainian international channel Freedom TV were killed in a Russian Lancet drone strike in Kramatorsk (Donetsk oblast) on 23 October 2025. The journalists were filming the aftermath of an earlier Russian strike at a gas station. Special correspondent Oleksandr Kolychev was wounded in the strike. The police is investigating the murder and wounding of Freedom TV crew as a war crime.
The funeral for Alyona Hramova (Hubanova) and Yevhen Karmazin took place at the St. Michael Cathedral in Kyiv on 27 October.
