"The three of us could have died in one day"

Oksana Budzak:

Trudivske is a small, quiet village. It is like ant other village around. People are suffering. What for? No one explains to you why all this is happening.  There are no jobs here. People have to go to Mariupol or Donetsk. We have nowhere to go now. People have to stay. They have no relatives in other towns or villages.

It happened on 17 February 2017. We were at home, in the room. I was sitting in one chair, and Husband was sitting in the other chair. The child was standing by the door.

Hennadii Budzak:

It was an evening time. Everything seemed fine. I went to look for a job that day. I was hired. So I had to do some arrangements. Then I came home. I was doing some chores. Wife was doing some household work as well. Then we heard a banging sound. When we heard the banging sound for the second time, the light went out. When I went up, the light was already out.

Oksana Budzak:

I was talking on the phone at that time. I thought that my phone would explode. We didn't even know what happened. It was a matter of a second. We could hear ringing in our ears. Husband started shouting, "Let's go to the basement." That banging, exploding sound was horrible. It was very scary.

We went to the yard. Pieces of slate, boards were lying around. We started to run. Our basement is located a little further. We ran to the basement. When we got down, we turned on the telephone to flash on. I found out that the husband and the son were wounded.

There was an agricultural installation neighbours had nearby. It was dark when we were running. We didn't see that it was destroyed. A shell hit this shed. The fragments from it hit us.

The neighbour's farmstead was damaged as well. The calves they kept got killed. The neighbor and her son were at home, but they were in another room. Otherwise, they would have been hurt, too. The fragments from the shell hit everything on their way. They hit the wall, the furniture.

Son Danylo Dudzak, 15 years old.

He fell down. When he woke up, he could hear Dad screaming, "Go to the basement!" S we went down to the basement. When we looked around in the basement, we noticed that Dad had his arm wounded. I had my shoulder wounded. Thank God, Mothere was unhurt.  We sat in the basement and went up to the house. And there... well, we had the wounds bandaged.  The shelling continued for about half an hour.

Then a nurse who lives in the village came running. She provided first aid. Then we called an ambulance and went to the hospital.

Oksana Budzak:

The child was 15 years old. He has never been sick in any way. So he registered as a disabled until he would turn 18. It was very painful to accept it. The child's hand does not function as it should. Doctors said, "Everything will be fine, he just needs to exercise." Let's hope everything will be fine. 

Hennadii Budzak:

The following day, right at 07:00 a.m., a case conference gathered to consider his case. They took some pictures, examined the area where the fragment hit. They performed an operation and got it out. All doctors say he was born lucky. The fragment got into the shoulder and stopped by the carotid artery. One fragment got in the collarbone and other went through.

Oksana Budzak:

It was very scary. When I think that the three of us could have died on in one day, I get terrified. Well, the doctor said, "Your son is blessed by God, that is for sure. He is very lucky.

He is our only child. So we did everything for him. I don't even want to think that he might have been gone that awful day.

We received a call from Rinat Akhmetov Center "Let Us Help" on 18 February.    We told what had happened, and they told us that they were ready to help us. They offered us medication. They said that they would help us if we needed anything, including rehabilitation.

Danylo:

The Foundation offered us trip tickets for 21 days. We agreed. The services included electrotherapy, halotherapy, swimming pool, bathtub, massage. I would like to express my gratitude to Rinat Akhmetov for making this trip possible for me. He understood what we had been through and offered his help.

Oksana Budzak:

We low bow to such people that they do not remain indifferent to someone else's misfortunes. They do not leave people in trouble. It was very important in the time like this. I wish other rich people were like him. You know, it is very hard to be alone in the situation like this.