Story Time!! Gather in!!

Today I share the story of the Commander of @GimliDivision. This is a translated version of what was published in October 2024 by 117 Heavy Mechanized Brigade.

A Hero’s Story:

On the eve of the full-scale invasion, Serhii was working abroad as a long-haul truck driver. He had traveled all over Europe. His career was going very successfully. A path was open for him and his family to move to Canada, but he chose the path of a warrior. Serhii met the beginning of the full-scale war in France.

•“My wife called me — my wife lives in Chernihiv. She called around three or four in the morning. At that time, I was in France. She said the war had started. I said, ‘How can it have started?!’ She said, ‘It has — we’re being shelled.’ I made my decision.

At the beginning there were a lot of guys I knew very well, and they knew me. When I said I was going to Ukraine, about 15 or 20 men agreed to go with me. But when, on the third day, the media reported that the enemy had advanced from Sumy all the way to Kyiv, most of the drivers — already 40–50 years old — hesitated.

I told my boss I was leaving. No one went with me, even though everyone had planned to. The boss called me into his office and said, ‘Do you understand that your behavior could ruin my business right now?’ I said, ‘Do you understand that my family is there? My wife is there, my daughter is there, my parents are there, all my relatives are there.’”…/2 🧵
“We could have taken the family to Poland, but I understood what the attitude might be like, and I knew it would be difficult. My daughter asked my wife, ‘Why isn’t Serhii coming?’ She said, ‘He is coming! You understand, it’s a long way to travel.’

The main reason I returned to Ukraine was what I felt inside. There was an inner feeling that I wouldn’t be able to keep living in Europe knowing I had left my parents, my wife, my family behind. No one supported me returning — except my wife. My parents said, ‘They’ll kill you! Stay there. You’ll be shot. They won’t let you through.’”

An offer from his employer to move his family to Poland did not change Serhii’s decision to return to Ukraine. Fellow countrymen and local Poles provided humanitarian aid. Some equipment had to be purchased in stores.

“The Poles treated this situation very well. They supported Ukraine at the beginning.”

The road home to the Chernihiv region across all of Ukraine was not easy.

“That’s where I saw the first strikes. Houses were destroyed. Armored vehicles were standing and moving around, and the guys were already there, ready — with rifles, machine guns, body armor. I made it. Everything was fine. But when I finally arrived to my family, home, to my parents — I realized what horror was happening in the city itself.” …/3