Vladyslav Yesypenko, freelance correspondent working with Radio Liberty and Shelter, was inside a ten-storey building in Kharkiv’s Saltivka district as Russian forces struck it early on 9 August. He was in a seventh floor apartment at the moment of the attack, Yesypenko told IMI journalist Valentyna Troyan.
The strike destroyed and damaged apartments on floors 7 to 10. The journalist’s car was damaged as well.
According to Yesypenko, he was in an apartment with a friend at the time of the strike.
“What saved me and my friend was that the apartment was on the opposite side of the building from where the missile hit. We tried breaking down doors in neighbouring apartments, searching for people. We got into a neighbour’s flat on the same 7th floor — he’d got out on his own, but I was really surprised he’d survived, because there was no ceiling in his apartment, and you could see straight through the hole where the apartments on the floors above used to be. My friend and I were carrying water in bottles and putting out the fire on the 8th floor until the firefighters arrived,” Vladyslav Yesypenko said.
The journalist also praised the swift work of the rescuers, medics, and psychologists at the scene of the strike.
Vladyslav Yesypenko added that he has had to postpone a reporting trip to Kherson that had been planned for after 20 August due to his car being damaged.
As reported earlier, a filming crew with STB TV was targeted by Russian FPV drones while travelling with Ukrainian servicemembers and press officer in Dnipropetrovsk oblast late on 6 August. The reporters and soldiers managed to get out of their pickup truck in time; one of the drones attacked the empty vehicle shortly after.