“I haven’t gone to Starobelsk yet. It's scary to go back"

Alina

fourth-year student at Starobel Pedagogical College, friend of the deceased Veronica Dashchenko and Oksana Tereshchenko

I am from the Troitsky district [Lugansk region]. The war started when I was finishing school. My parents and I decided that I would study in Starobelsk, because they didn’t want to let me go far from them, and financially they couldn’t afford anything else.

Oksana Tereshchenko - we called her Ksyusha - from Bulgakovka, Kremensky district . She used to study in Lisichansk, but there she also once came under fire and barely escaped. She came to us in the middle of her first year. Initially, few people talked to her because she was new. And then our curator invited her to become the head of the group and the fifth floor of the dorm. Ksyusha was responsible and kept us in discipline.

She lived in the same room with her younger sister Katya and Veronica. Veronica is from Severodonetsk. We met her when we entered the Starobelsky Pedagogical College to become a primary school teacher. In the first year we didn’t communicate much, but in the third we became friends.

Veronica always smiled, was positive, and joked in class. I have never seen her sad or cry. She was very sincere. She played volleyball and took part in competitions in Lugansk.

The three of us, Ksyusha and Veronica, communicated closely and did homework together. In addition to studying, we walked in the park, went to cafes and bars, but by nine in the evening we returned to the dorm. Ksyusha had a boyfriend, Veronica also recently met a young man.

During the attacks, we sat in the basement and discussed exams and graduation dresses. Our graduation is June 30th. Everyone was already accustomed to the fact that there was a war going on in the country, and none of my friends started talking about politics.

We didn’t talk about the future, but none of us wanted to work in our profession. During pre-diploma practice in the lower grades, we realized how difficult it is: both because of the documentation [which teachers are required to maintain] and because children are different. After college, Veronica and Ksyusha were going to enroll in Severodonetsk by correspondence. For whom - I forgot.

Before that [May 22], there were also arrivals in Starobelsk. When we were in our second and third years, the siren howled every hour, and we constantly sat in the basement. This was very annoying, because you didn’t have time to eat, shop, or do assignments. But everyone understood that this was necessary. The vocational college also came to us because they don’t have a basement. At the same time, none of us thought that the basement would help if it flew into [the dorm building]. One day, a drone fell into the backyard of the college and was disarmed by [EMERCOM employees].

That night I was in the hostel. I usually go home on Thursdays, but we had a test that Friday, so I stayed. The Pedagogical College is a five-story building. On the top two floors there is a dormitory, and from the first to the third there is a university and college. Around ten in the evening the [air] raid started and we went down to the first floor. This year we rarely went down to the basement, we mostly sat on the first floor - there are long corridors and no windows, it’s like you’re in a tunnel.

This time we sat there for two hours. We heard something explode and drones fly by.

Then we were allowed into the rooms, the attendant told us not to turn on the lights and sit quietly. We literally sat for about 20 minutes, then raised the alarm again. We were told to sit on the fourth floor in the corridors. And then the drone flew into a car that was parked in the backyard of the college - it exploded. Panic began in the corridors, everyone ran to the first floor.

About 10 seconds passed, and two more drones arrived. The plaster fell down. The children began to run out into the street, but there was a white shroud [of construction dust], and not everyone could get out. The building has two exits, the main one is closed at night. I picked up the first-year girl, and we ran to the second exit. Everyone who could ran out and hid in the backyard among the fir trees and bushes.

At this moment, the drones began to attack in full. I raised my head: a drone was flying about 20 meters above us, dropping its supplies, shooting and bombing. A black dot flies and explodes. First there were two trips to a professional college, then to ours. Fiery fragments flew, and before our eyes the ped caught fire. This was all purposeful - specifically to colleges.

I called my parents. Dad shouted at me to run as far away from the ped as possible. But we could not climb over the iron fence around the hostel. There were two freshmen and two sophomores with me. We sat through 16 explosions, and then finally climbed over the fence and ran away as far as possible. One girl and I were first picked up by friends, and then my dad took us home. I only have scratches and a bruise on my leg.

I didn’t see Ksyusha and Veronica that night. Then they told me that there were a lot of casualties, a lot of people were knocked down. A boy from my group, Maxim Kopylov, was pulled out from under the slabs and had to have his leg amputated.

At first they wrote to our group at Max that Veronica and Ksyusha were alive. But the next day, the curator, in tears, told us in a voice that Veronica was gone. I asked about Ksyusha, and the curator said that she had just been to the morgue and identified her. Ksyusha had no parents; it seems her mother died. What remains is my younger sister Katya, a third-year student, who is in the hospital.

While some children were still alive, they sent videos from under the rubble to their parents, saying that they could hear the rescuers. When rescuers got them out, they had to stop their work every now and then because the drones started flying again. They didn't shoot, they just flew.

I don’t even know why it came to our college. They write that there were military facilities nearby, or that military personnel lived there and collected spare parts for drones. Even in our village, some say that we still need to figure out what happened and how it happened. This is nonsense. There was no smell of military there. There are them in the city; there is a checkpoint at the entrance to it. But there were never any military personnel near the college. It’s still scary - it could fly anywhere at any moment.

Nazar

student of Lugansk National Taras Shevchenko University, acquaintance of Artem Kovtun

Artem is my best friend's cousin. He was a calm and kind guy, he never did anything bad to anyone, on the contrary, he was always ready to help.

I studied to become a programmer in my third year. He worked in the administration of Starobelsk and was actively involved in sports. The last time I saw him was at the gym.

He spent a lot of time with his girlfriend Kira. They were supposed to get married this summer. Kira came to the identification parade with an envelope full of money. She said that they were saving this money for their engagement.

Julia

third-year student at Starobelsky Professional College of Luhansk Pedagogical University , friend of the deceased Alisa Bryukhovetskaya and Anna Pogribnichenko

I have known Alice for two years. When all the students moved into the dorm at Starobelsky Vocational College in their first year, they walked around the rooms and got to know the girls. That's how I met Alice.

Alisa is from the Novopskovsky district , and I am from the village of Belokurakino ( both in the Lugansk region - note from Berega ). At first, Alice and I both studied at a vocational college, I studied as a cook, she studied as a hairdresser. But she didn’t like it: she studied for a year and 10 months and transferred to the Starobelsky Pedagogical College - to become a primary school teacher.

Alice was a first-year student there [before her death]. She wanted to work with children. She had many plans. She said that she felt very good in the new hostel, she had friends there, they walked around happily, had a good time.

She was a close person to me, I have a lot of memories with her. She loved adrenaline: driving a car at high speed, climbing abandoned streets - whatever you offer, she was always up for it. Alice was kind, you could rely on her, talk to her, laugh with her. She never refused anyone anything and was always ready to help.

We walked a lot together. The last time was on the 10th of May in the park. The last time we spoke was on May 16th. I was at home in Belokurakino, and she was in Starobelsk. We called her and chatted.

On the morning of May 22, I read the news in the public pages. Then our mutual friends started writing to me, asking where she was, but I didn’t know. Then there were lists [of the dead], I checked them all. At first, Alice was listed as missing. Everyone hoped to the last that she would be found alive. And then the college group wrote that her death was officially confirmed. When they started shelling, she tried to run out into the street and did not have time to either run out or reach [the shelter]. They say she was burned alive.

I have known Anya [Pogribnichenko] not long ago. We met by chance. She also lived in Belokurakino, and one day we stood at the bus station and started talking. She studied to become a kindergarten teacher in her second year of pedagogical college.

After that, we often saw each other at the bus station, rode home on the same bus and chatted. She loved to talk, there was always a topic for conversation with her. Anya was very kind, bright, sincere and cheerful. She had a lot of energy and love.

I also first learned about her death from the public news. Like Alice, Anya was first on the list of missing persons. Later she was found on the fifth floor - under a concrete slab.

Anya wanted to have a wedding in the summer. Her boyfriend is now in the army, in the Northern Military District zone. But because of this terrible tragedy, all her dreams were cut short. It's hard for me to realize that she's gone.

Neither Alice nor Anya ever touched upon this topic [of war]. All I have left from Alice is her sweatshirt - as a memory.

Before the start of the SVO, I had never been to Starobelsk. It's a beautiful city, but now there's an air raid alert and a curfew. Usually the siren starts sounding when a drone or something else is already flying. Previously, in such cases, everyone from our college was sent to the ped's basement. That night, some children also went down [from the dormitory] to the basement. But [I heard that] when [the Ukrainian drones] flew strongly and the building caught fire, they began to run out into the street, some jumped from the windows.

All that remains of my college are the walls. The pedagogical college is destroyed, some parts of the building are more or less intact, but I was told that, most likely, these buildings do not belong to restoration.

Since the tragedy, I have not yet traveled to Starobelsk, but I plan to go. It’s scary to return - not because of the likelihood of new arrivals, but because of the tragedy. But sooner or later it will be necessary to go to the memorial.

Irina Novik