Known by his call sign Surovyi, meaning "strict," the 40-year-old serviceman faced near-certain death after an attack drone tore through the front lines of eastern Ukraine, shattering his leg. What followed was five harrowing days crawling through scrub, hiding in ditches, and burying himself in dirt and pine needles to avoid detection by Russian surveillance drones buzzing above like predators hunting prey.
"My leg went numb... I knew I had to move or we would be killed," Surovyi recalled from a field hospital where he was finally rescued by members of his brigade, underlining the terror of modern warfare, where the battlefield is dominated by drones that can spot and strike from ten kilometers away, turning every move into a life-or-death gamble.
Even as Russian FPV drones whizzed dangerously close, attempting to strike him and a fellow soldier, Surovyi refused to give up. Inch by inch, he crawled across the battlefield, five days of agony under constant threat, until he finally reached safety.
<social>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSTDxn0aC_E</social>
"I couldn't walk anymore. I went on all fours, up and down, all on my knees," he said, recalling the extreme lengths he went to survive. For Surovyi, the ordeal was personal too: his son's birthday fell in the midst of his escape. "My son's birthday was on the 3rd, but it was me who got a little gift," he said, his grim humor cutting through the horrors of his story.
In a war where drones have created sprawling "kill zones" along the front, evacuating the wounded has become a near-impossible task, making Surovyi's survival all the more extraordinary. Now, you can learn more about his story in the video above.
Of course, this isn't the first story of its kind. Just a few days ago, another Ukrainian soldier defied odds and survived five days crawling with his throat cut by Russian troops. Then, he documented his ordeal, which you can learn more about in the video below.
<social>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2axRjmrRIYg</social>