Blacked-out ambulances and bomb-cratered roads: On the night shift with Ukraine’s military medics
As night draws across the eastern front medical teams wait nervously behind the frontline.
They know it will be a busy night – every night is busy these days as Russia intensifies its attacks in the Donbas.
The chief medic, Yaroslav, takes the first call of the shift.
His face is filled with concern as he’s informed in the voice message that there are many casualties. Some are walking wounded, others are not so lucky.
His team is quickly on its way. Climbing aboard their ambulance and heading out into the inky night, there is no time to lose and they need to move fast.
As they race towards the rendezvous point, we film with a night-vision camera, any unnecessary light could draw enemy fire.
This is dangerous work. The deadly drone and artillery war is all around them.
The threat is now so bad the team prefers, when they can, to work only at night. In daylight the risk of being targeted by Russian drones is often too great.
A few kilometres from the frontline and the team comes to a stop.
Hidden by the dark they try to call the injured soldiers’ unit to tell them they are waiting in an exposed location but there’s no answer.
“Sometimes there is shelling and they can’t evacuate from the position,” says medic Valeri.
Shellshocked casualties emerge from the gloom
Out of the gloom the first casualties eventually arrive for the handover. All of them look gaunt and shellshocked. The grime and terror of this grinding trench war is etched into their faces.
One of the soldiers tells me how they were injured.
“They destroyed the position. With drones they completely destroyed it – thank god we survived. One person died but I was blown away by the explosion. I was lucky.”
Ukraine is facing a shortage of manpower and the country is having to recruit older men for its defence.
As Misha waits for first aid he tells me he’s in pain: “The shrapnel is sticking out of my leg. My leg is swollen and my other leg hurts too, I probably twisted it.”
Medics smoke as they wait nervously for casualties to arrive. Pic: Alex Rossi
‘Shells crash around us’
With the men patched up and on their way for more medical treatment, the evacuation team is soon responding to a new call.
Along broken roads and bomb-cratered dirt tracks they bump along through the night. As they arrive at a second evacuation point it’s clear we are now much closer to the frontline.
Andriy is rescued with serious shrapnel wounds
The sound of guns is deafening and as we wait anxiously in open fields shells crash around us.
Eventually the casualty arrives – there’s much more urgency in this extraction
Andriy is suffering from serious shrapnel wounds and he’s clearly in shock as he’s stretchered into the waiting ambulance.
Yaroslav gives first aid in the ambulance. Pic: Alex Rossi
The medics set up a drip and only once he’s stabilised can they start to drive.
The windows have been blacked out, which means they can work with more light, and as they go his condition is carefully monitored.
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Yaroslav explains what they have done as we start to move.
“The intravenous line wasn’t working so we had to move it so we had access to his vein.
“This way, if everything goes wrong we have the ability to deliver medicine to help him. He’s okay, he’s stable. He’s heavily wounded but stable.”
Andriy soon arrives at a medical facility – he’ll later undergo surgery – and the medical evacuation team will soon head back into the dark to treat and extract more casualties.
Every night it seems the carnage and destruction of this war gets worse.
Israel has approved a plan to capture all of the Gaza Strip and remain there for an unspecified length of time, Israeli officials say.
According to Reuters, the plan includes distributing aid, though supplies will not be let in yet.
The Israeli official told the agency that the newly approved offensive plan would move Gaza’s civilian population southward and keep humanitarian aid from falling into Hamas’s hands.
On Sunday, the United Nations rejected what it said was a new plan for aid to be distributed in what it described as Israeli hubs.
Israeli cabinet ministers approved plans for the new offensive on Monday morning, hours after it was announced that tens of thousands of reserve soldiers are being called up.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has so far failed to achieve his goal of destroying Hamas or returning all the hostages, despite more than a year of brutal war in Gaza.
Palestinian children struggle to get donated food at a community kitchen in Khan Younis, Gaza. Pic: AP
Officials say the plan will help with these war aims but it would also push hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to southern Gaza, exacerbating an already dire humanitarian crisis.
They said the plan included the “capturing of the strip and the holding of territories”.
It would also try to prevent Hamas from distributing humanitarian aid, which Israel says strengthens the group’s rule in Gaza.
The UN rejected the plan, saying it would leave large parts of the population, including the most vulnerable, without supplies.
It said it “appears designed to reinforce control over life-sustaining items as a pressure tactic – as part of a military strategy”.
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More than 52,000 Palestinians have been killed since the IDF launched its ground offensive in the densely-populated territory, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
It followed the deadly Hamas attacks on Israel, which killed 1,200 people and saw around 250 people taken hostage.
A fragile ceasefire that saw a pause in the fighting and the exchange of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners collapsed earlier this year.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to retaliate against the Houthis and their Iranian “masters” after the group launched a missile attack on the country’s main international airport.
A missile fired by the group from Yemen landed near Ben Gurion Airport, causing panic among passengers in the terminal building.
“Attacks by the Houthis emanate from Iran,” Mr Netanyahu wrote on X. “Israel will respond to the Houthi attack against our main airport AND, at a time and place of our choosing, to their Iranian terror masters.”
Israeli police officers investigate the missile crater. Pic: Reuters
The missile impact left a plume of smoke and briefly halted flights and commuter traffic at the airport. Some international carriers have cancelled flights to and from Tel Aviv for several days.
Four people were lightly wounded, paramedic service Magen David Adom said.
Air raid sirens went off across Israel and footage showed passengers yelling and rushing for cover.
The attack came hours before senior Israeli cabinet ministers were set to vote on whether to intensify the country’s military operations in the Gaza Strip, and as the army began calling up thousands of reserves in anticipation of a wider operation in the enclave.
Houthi military spokesperson Brigadier General Yahya Saree said the group fired a hypersonic ballistic missile at the airport.
Iran’s defence minister later told a state TV broadcaster that if the country was attacked by the US or Israel, it would target their bases, interests and forces where necessary.
Israel’s military said several attempts to intercept the missile were unsuccessful.
Air, road and rail traffic were halted after the attack, police said, though it resumed around an hour later.
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Yemen’s Houthis have been firing missiles at Israel since its war with Hamas in Gaza began on 7 October 2023, and while most have been intercepted, some have penetrated the country’s missile defence systems and caused damage.
Israel has previously struck the group in Yemen in retaliation and the US and UK have also launched strikes after the Houthis began attacking international shipping, saying it was in solidarity with Palestinians over Israel’s war with Hamas.
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