The war in Ukraine has been going on for more than two years. (File)
Ukrainian drone pilot Andriy began drawing the horrors of war with his graphic pencil, trying to maintain his sanity even as he realized he had seen a close friend die.
“You put these emotions down on paper in your free time and it helps you not to go crazy,” said the 48-year-old, taking a break from flying his reconnaissance drone in eastern Ukraine.
“The monsters I draw cannot be filmed or photographed, but they have been my reality for the last two years,” he said.
One of the drawings stands out.
It depicts the agony of a soldier who Andriy watched for hours through his drone, before realizing he knew him very well.
The sketch depicts a wounded Ukrainian soldier, lying on the ground among ruins, surrounded by four corpses and raising his hand in a cry for help.
He is looking, with his face turned towards the sky, towards the center of the drawing.
It’s as if he’s looking at the viewer watching him through the drone’s camera.
Ghosts appear among the ruins behind him, with the word “WATER” written repeatedly to his right.
‘I had no idea’
“A modest little drawing in a notebook, but there is a story behind it. That’s exactly what I saw with my own eyes,” he said.
The scene occurred during the battle for Klishchiivka last summer, a village near Bakhmut that Russia captured in May 2023 after months of fighting.
As he watched through his drone’s camera, Andriy had no idea that the dying soldier was a close friend from the Donbas call sign.
Both volunteered in the southern city of Odesa and fought side by side in the same brigade, including at Avdiivka, where Andriy piloted a Browning heavy machine gun.
They were then transferred to the 22nd brigade, where Andriy became a drone pilot.
“I had no idea it was ‘Donbas’. I just saw a man, alive, barely moving his hand towards the drone. He was lying on a pile of broken bricks,” he said.
“We kept an eye on him all day.”
Back at base after the long shift, Andriy discovered the soldier’s identity.
He was told that Donbass had led an attack with a small group of fighters when a projectile landed nearby.
“They were unlucky,” said Andriy.
‘Just one sip’
Donbass was the only one who survived the immediate attack, but his legs were broken.
He crawled a little under the scorching sun until he reached a radio.
“He repeated just one word: ‘water, water, water…’. People continued to listen to him until the signal went off,” he said, citing radio operators.
“He could barely breathe at the end… It was a terrible death,” Andriy said.
At first surprised by the news, Andriy sat down on the bed to draw.
The horrors he witnessed did not deter him.
He said he was fighting “for the survival of Ukraine as a nation.”
“I realized that we are an outpost between Europe and a horde of cannibals.”
(Except the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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