As Russia's attacks on Ukraine's cities intensify and autumn's cooler temperatures hint at another tough winter to come, Ukrainians are wrestling with how to meet the twin challenges ahead: Russian drone and missile strikes and the biting cold. "It was a very difficult winter last year in Kyiv," says mother of two Mariia Shostak, who is now packing her bags and leaving her small flat. With prolonged periods of sub-zero temperatures and frequent power cuts brought about by Russia's attack on the country's power grid, last winter was one of the hardest so far.
"There were some days and weeks that were unbearable. I started thinking I'm not going through another winter like this." Mariia is not even waiting for winter. Russia's latest assaults on the capital have forced her hand.
"Everything changed in late August and the beginning of September, when Kyiv started being attacked around the clock," she said. "Earlier, the drones and missiles were intercepted somewhere on the outskirts. Now it was happening in the centre, right above our heads." After weeks of escalating Russian attacks, which by the end of September had included petrol stations, power plants and key bridges over the Dnipro river, Kyiv mayor Vitaly Klitschko said the city was facing a "very dramatic situation".
The attacks, he said, were "tearing Kyiv apart". Mariia's children, four-year-old Artur and Kira, who's two, were both born after Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. Unwilling to subject them to another miserable, dangerous winter, she's taking them abroad.
They plan to spend the winter in Hurghada, on Egypt's Red Sea coast. It's cheaper than Europe, Mariia explains, and warmer too. "I don't feel safe in Ukraine in any way," she says.
Polls show that many Ukrainians are feeling the same way, even if not everyone has yet made such a radical decision. A September survey by the Gradus research company found that 40% of Ukrainians were considering relocating if living conditions continued to deteriorate; 35% said they would not move elsewhere, while 25% were undecided. "People are thinking about a combination of stress factors," Evgeniya Blyznyuk, Gradus's founder and CEO, told us.
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