In eastern Ukraine, quiet nights in the dimly lit hallways of frontline medical posts can be instantly crushed. Medic gets excited from the three plush, Donetsk Front.
They work with chest oppression and screaming urgency until it is revealed that the soldiers are too late. The room is silent as his body is sealed in a white bag.
Evacuation took so long that he couldn’t be saved, the anesthesiologist said. By the time he reached the stabilization point, he was already dead.
It was not an isolated case, but part of a wider change In war When medical evacuation is becoming increasingly difficult.
“because The drone’s …It could reach far, the danger is dangerous for the injured themselves and the crew who are now working to drive them out,” said Darina Boyko, anesthesiologist at the “ULF” medical services for the 108th Da Vinci Wolf Battalion.
In the early months of Russia’s full-scale invasion, evacuation vehicles could reach almost Frontlineto improve the chances of survival for injured people.
Currently, the massive use of first-person vision (FPV) drones that allow operators to see their targets before a strike has transformed them from the frontline into kill zones up to 20 kilometers (12 miles). Medic says they have not treated gunshot wounds for months, and most injuries now come from FPV.
Drones are the most feared weapons because they reduce the chances of survival of already injured people by complicating their accuracy and evacuation.
For the large Ukrainian army, it makes the conservation crew even more difficult.
Evacuation in the kill zone
The increasing use of FPVs has also made it difficult to move injured people between points, along with Callsign Buhall, who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons, said the commander of the 59th Brigade Medical Unit.
“Everything is getting harder. Work needs to be more mobile. You need a level of manipulation of change, a level of safety,” he said.
Asked whether these conditions increase the mortality rate among injured people, he replied: “Perhaps. There’s nothing you can do. Everything is burning from those FPVs – all, even tanks.”
He explained that munitions carry bills from rocket-propelled hand-ren bullets. This is a shoulder fire weapon that fires explosives designed to stab an armored vehicle. When it explodes, a jet of molten metal and fragments penetrates the cabin at extreme temperatures. This impact can cause anything from minor cuts and burns to severe wounds including cuttings, cuttings, depending on where the fragment hits and their size.
While Buhole said self-adjusting and self-evacuation are currently being emphasized during training, the presence of kill zones means that soldiers can be stuck in a place for days or weeks, especially if the wounds are not life-threatening immediately.
Safe on foot
When Artem Fursov arrived at the stabilization post with three other soldiers a late night, Buhor inspected his wounds, praised the bandages on his arm, and asked who did it. It was the work of fellow soldiers and an example of effective self-support, Buhor said.
Fasov, 38, was injured when explosives were dropped from a drone on August 4th, but did not reach medical profession until five days later. He had to walk a few kilometres to be safe. The little wooden cross he had worn under his clothes all along is now hanging from his chest.
“You can’t even raise your head up there. This is already a robot war,” he said of the frontline. “And the Russians are coming in like their own backyard.”
Valentin Pidovalni, a 25-year-old attacker, was injured in the back by a rap shotgun, but said it would be easier than trying to survive a day as an infantryman in a month of 2022.
“It’s a very hard sector,” he said. “But if you don’t destroy them, they’ll take the whole tree line, the town, and the whole area.”
I was forced to keep moving
Buhole has been working in the Pokrovsk region since the second half of 2022. When the troops are forced to retreat, the stabilization point must also move. In the past two and a half years, Buhole and his team have moved 17 times.
They left the previous location to the sound of the FPV drone.
Other stabilization points face the same situation.
Boiko, of “ULF” medical services, recalls that in the beginning of the winter, when the stabilization point was still in Pokrovsk, he still had gunshot injuries. This meant there was more direct contact between infantry on both sides, first row of defence lines.
A few months later, things changed dramatically.
They try to protect themselves as much as possible – limit movement and use camouflage to equip all vehicles with an electronic warfare system. Their evacuees only go out with body armor and helmets.
“We try to protect both ourselves and the injured and do everything we can to hold our position as long as possible, and if we have to go back and move further, the evacuation route for the injured will be longer.
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Associated Press reporters Vasilisa Stepanenko, Evgeniy Maloletka and Volodymyr Yurchuk of the Dmytro Zhyhinas in the Donetsk region and Kyiv in Ukraine contributed to the report.
