‘Like a normal man’: How bionic limbs are helping Ukrainian troops injured in war
A tall man emerged from an array of gym equipment, walking towards me, slightly swaying as his prosthetic leg flexed and stepped in time with his natural one.
His right arm was missing, and his left was a smooth black prosthesis arm with his hands and fingers clenched in a fist.
He was introduced to me as Anton. I wasn’t sure how to greet him other than to say hello.
He saw my hesitation, and smiling he raised his left arm to shake my hand, his fingers opening and closing around my hand as we observed a customary gesture of greeting – a handshake.
His handshake was gentle and completely natural. I was simply amazed. I’ve never seen or experienced anything like it.
“Wow, it works,” I said.
“Yes, it does,” he replied with a smirk, and then carried on walking down the corridor.
This was to be a day of incredible experiences.
We are in the Tytanova Rehabilitation Centre in Kyiv. Much of it is a large gymnasium kitted out with state-of-the-art equipment designed for amputees to keep fit and rehabilitate.
The amputees are all soldiers injured in the war with Russia. These men may never fight again, but they’re in a renewed battle to rebuild their lives, and here they’re being helped with extraordinary technology.
It’s called osseointegration – a titanium implant that is connected to the bone of the patient and the prosthetic arm or leg clicks on to that.
But this is the remarkable bit. The nervous system in their limb is gone so they learn to send messages to their muscles and their new arm or leg comes alive, following instructions from their brain.
The technology was first used in Ukraine a year ago and can be used on all limbs.
We meet Oleksandr Solomiany, 48, who lost his right arm last December in the battle of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine. Before the war, he was a tech entrepreneur specialising in the environment.
Oleksandr is still learning how to use his new arm. He walked us through a parking lot and into another building for another training session.
This isn’t a physical training session though, it’s a mental one. He will be practising how to teach his brain to command his muscles to move his bionic arm.
It’s his third session and he says it will take at least two or three more months before he gains the skills to fully operate it.
Oleksandr sits down and takes off his t-shirt, he then removes his bionic arm so that sensory wires can be attached to his amputated arm and to the chest and back muscles surrounding it.
The training session today will be with a bionic prosthetic arm that is not physically attached to him, only wired into him.
“What are you trying to do?” I ask him while he looks at a screen, concentrating hard.
“I imagine that I close my arm and rotate,” he tells me while moving the prosthetic using his brain and chest muscles.
Oleksandr’s trainer Yaroslav Patsukevych is a biomedical engineer who volunteers here.
48-year-old Oleksandr Solomiany who lost his right arm last December in the battle of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine
He explains to me: “You can fool the system to overwrite the muscles that you usually use with your hands, for example, to teach the chest muscles to do the same thing.
“When the patient contracts his muscle, this prosthesis calibrates with his brain and recreates this command with the prosthesis.”
I asked Yaroslav where this prosthesis comes from. He told me the hand is made in Britain, the arm is made in America, and the technology is Swedish.
And the man – I think to myself – is Ukrainian.
Yaroslav Patsukevych (left) is helping Oleksandr learn to use his new limb
For Oleksandr, even though this is mental training it is physically draining. I ask him if it’s a big experience for him, realising that he can actually have an arm that works.
“It’s the first stage of [a] long, long way in my life. It’s only my first prosthesis and technologies never stop. I will expect another technology, like chip in the brain, or something else,” he replies.
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Oleksandr leads a very active life and has no regrets about his battle injury – the focus is now on the future.
“This arm helps me with my routine, with my everyday tasks. I feel better with this arm, like normal people, like a normal man.”
The osseointegration surgery costs £20,000 for each lost limb, while a prosthetic arm or leg costs £80,000.
Viacheslav Zaporozhets (right) founded Tytanova Rehab and also supports evacuations from the frontline
The founder of Tytanova Rehab, Viacheslav Zaporozhets, is a millionaire businessman who wanted to help with the war effort. He fundraises money to help more and more men, and he says the beneficial effects on the amputees are immediate.
“I’ll tell you this, we’re bringing them back to life, even in a psychological sense,” Viacheslav Zaporozhets says.
“I always say, you’re not broken. We’ll teach you how to drive, even how to swim.
“From day one, we demonstrate this. When a new patient arrives, a veteran greets them and shows them what they’ve learned to do.”
A soldier who lost both legs exercises at Tytanova Rehab, Kyiv
He and his organisation don’t just rehabilitate the injured, they also evacuate them from the frontlines.
With their 22 ambulances, they’ve saved the lives of over 30,000 men since the start of the war, bringing them to safety.
The figure is, frankly, mind-blowing.
This war has claimed the lives of huge numbers of fighting men, but the figure itself is not published.
But we do know that the number of living casualties will be much, much higher, and these “bionic men” are just a fraction of them.
Israel pounded the outskirts of Gaza City overnight, as Benjamin Netanyahu’s government vowed to press on with a planned offensive on the city.
Families streamed out of the city as the explosions hit.
“I stopped counting the times I had to take my wife and three daughters and leave my home in Gaza City,” said Mohammad, 40.
“No place is safe, but I can’t take the risk. If they suddenly begin the invasion, they will use heavy fire.”
Mahmoud Abedrabo mourns over the body of his son Hamada in Gaza City on 24 August. Pic: Reuters
Others said they would prefer to die and not leave.
“We are not leaving, let them bomb us at home,” said Aya, 31, who has a family of eight, adding that they couldn’t afford to buy a tent or pay for the transportation.
“We are hungry, afraid and don’t have money,” she said.
Mourners pray next to the body of Palestinian boy Hamada Abedrabo on 24 August. Pic: Reuters
Witnesses said that overnight they heard nonstop explosions in Zeitoun and Shejaia.
Tanks shelled houses and roads in Sabra, and buildings were blown up in Jabalia.
On Sunday, the IDF said its forces had returned to combat in Jabalia to strengthen its control of the area and dismantle militant tunnels.
Smoke rises following an Israeli strike in Gaza City. Pic: Reuters
It added that the operation there “enables the expansion of combat into additional areas and prevents Hamas terrorists from returning to operate in these areas.”
This month, Israel approved a plan to seize control of Gaza City. The offensive isn’t expected to start for another few weeks.
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In the meantime, mediators in Egypt and Qatar are trying to resume ceasefire talks between the two sides.
On Friday, Israel’s defence minister Israel Katz said that Gaza City will be razed unless Hamas releases all its remaining hostages and ends the war on Israel’s terms.
Mourners transport the body of Ahmed Balata on 24 August. Pic: Reuters
Around half of Gaza’s two million residents currently live in the city and on Friday a global hunger monitor said that Gaza City and its surrounding areas are officially suffering from famine that will likely spread.
Israel said the monitor ignores steps Israel has taken since late July to increase aid supplies into and across Gaza.
Eight more people died of malnutrition and starvation in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry on Saturday.
281 people, including 114 children, have now died of malnutrition and starvation since the war started, according to the ministry.
The war began on 7 October 2023, when Hamas-led gunmen killed around 1,200 people in southern Israel, mainly civilians, and took 251 hostages.
Since then, Israel has killed at least 62,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza health ministry, and internally displaced nearly its entire population.
Two married couples have died after a British car veered off the road and crashed in Germany, according to police.
The fatal accident happened shortly after midnight on Saturday in the trees near a highway in the Kassel district, north of Hesse in central Germany.
The 32-year-old male driver, a 31-year-old female passenger, a 32-year-old female passenger, and a 30-year-old female passenger all died at the scene, despite the efforts of German emergency services.
Sky News understands UK officials have not been contacted for assistance.
At roughly 12.30am on Saturday, the car appears to have veered off the road and crashed into nearby trees around 30m from the road, according to the Kassel police department.
Pic: Feuerwehr Reinhardshagen
One of the victim’s phones automatically alerted the emergency services to the incident, who sent an ambulance to the scene.
Soon, fire engines, ambulances, command vehicles and emergency support vehicles were all dispatched.
When emergency workers arrived, the car was lying on its side, wedged between several trees.
It wasn’t until they removed the roof that they found all four passengers.
Pic: Feuerwehr Reinhardshagen
The accident happened on Highway L3229
The emergency workers who dealt with the victims were immediately supported by the specialist mental health workers at the fire station in Reinhardshagen.
“This high number of deaths is an extraordinary operation for our Reinhardshagen Volunteer Fire Department,” said a fire department spokesperson.
“For some of the emergency personnel, it is the first time they have been confronted with death in this way.
“Therefore, a great deal is being done to help us process these images. We will also discuss this among ourselves and within families, because not everyone can easily shake off what they have seen.”
An investigation into the accident is ongoing and is being conducted by the Hofgeismar police station.
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