Thread by @MetroUK

This is one heart-warming story 💛

The British husband of a Ukrainian woman stranded in her own country has driven his van more than 1,300 miles across Europe in the hope of rescuing her and her cat Lucky.

@samcug reports ✍️

🧵👇
trib.al/UZMFgVe

Steve Lucas, 65, from Magor, Wales, said he jumped in his battered Citroen van after his Kyiv-based wife, Anastasia, 51, sent him pictures of the burning skyline around her apartment and told him she was too terrified to run to a bomb shelter.

She had been forced to stay in the city until the war broke out due to UK immigration rules, Mr Lucas said, but they could soon be reunited following moves to relax visa requirements for Ukrainian refugees.

The 65-year-old drove non-stop for nearly 24 hours through France, Belgium, Germany and most of Poland before stopping for the night as he approached the border.

On Sunday he had crossed into Ukraine & now hopes to reach the western city of Lviv...

...where his wife has since managed to flee to.

‘She sent me a photo of the skyline and there were flames everywhere, the building across the road was on fire and she said her apartment was shaking all the time.'

'She was terrified and frantic to leave.'

‘Her friend told her that every time she ran for the shelter she was dodging dead bodies on the road and she couldn’t face doing that.’

Anastasia eventually found a taxi driver who would take her to a train station where she boarded one of the few services still running out of the city.

She was ‘adamant’ not to leave without her cat, said Mr Lucas, who has loaded his van with food, litter and a bed for the pet.

Read story in full here 👇
trib.al/UZMFgVe