Seeking assistance with civilian evacuations from Kramatorsk

Sunday 16 August 2026

There are moments in a war when the most valuable thing a person can possess is neither a weapon nor a uniform, but a motor vehicle, a calm disposition and the willingness to drive towards somewhere from which everyone else is trying to leave.

Kramatorsk remains one of the principal civilian centres of the Ukrainian-controlled Donbas. It is a city accustomed to war — perhaps far too accustomed to it. Yet familiarity with danger does not make danger disappear. Civilians remain in Kramatorsk and the surrounding communities for all manner of reasons. Some are elderly. Some are poor. Some have disabilities or chronic difficulties with mobility. Some have children, animals or possessions they cannot readily abandon. Some simply wait too long, hoping that the military situation will improve — until suddenly the decision to leave becomes urgent.

Civilian evacuation is therefore one of the most important forms of humanitarian volunteering in wartime Ukraine. It is also one of the most demanding.

We are inviting expressions of interest from people willing to participate in organised civilian evacuation work involving Kramatorsk. This is not an invitation to amateur adventure, battlefield tourism or displays of personal bravado. Nor should anybody imagine that evacuation work is glamorous. Much of it consists of driving, waiting, carrying luggage, reassuring frightened people, helping elderly passengers into vehicles, dealing patiently with confused arrangements and remaining composed when circumstances change.

Nevertheless, done properly and within an organised humanitarian framework, it can save lives.

What sort of person is suitable?

The first quality is calmness. A useful evacuation volunteer is not somebody who becomes excited by danger. Quite the reverse — the best volunteer is likely to be the person whose pulse remains comparatively steady when everyone else’s is rising. War produces confusion, rumours, delays and unexpected changes of plan. The capacity to listen to instructions and make sensible decisions without panic is indispensable.

The second is discipline. Humanitarian evacuation is a team activity. Volunteers must be prepared to follow the directions of the responsible coordinators, respect security restrictions and understand that plans may be altered or cancelled at short notice. Nobody is helped by the person who decides that he knows better than everyone else and sets off independently.

The third is patience and kindness. The people being evacuated may be frightened, exhausted or reluctant to leave their homes. Elderly people may move slowly. Children may cry. Families may bring more possessions than anticipated. People living under prolonged bombardment do not necessarily behave with the brisk efficiency of passengers boarding a scheduled train. A volunteer must treat evacuees with dignity — particularly when they are distressed.

A fourth quality is practical common sense. Evacuation work rewards people who can solve ordinary problems without fuss. Bags must be loaded, telephones charged, passengers counted and vehicles kept serviceable. Instructions need to be understood accurately. A good volunteer notices the small things before they become large problems.

Reliability is equally important. If a volunteer has undertaken to appear at a particular place at a particular time, other people’s plans may depend upon his or her doing so.

Humanitarian organisations cannot operate effectively with people who disappear, oversleep or change their minds without warning.

Physical condition matters as well. Volunteers need not be athletes or soldiers. Nevertheless, a reasonable level of general fitness, mobility and stamina is desirable. The work may involve long periods in vehicles, irregular hours, carrying luggage and helping people with limited mobility. Anyone undertaking such work should be sufficiently healthy and physically capable to perform these ordinary but sometimes strenuous tasks safely.

Those who drive should naturally be competent, cautious and experienced drivers. Wartime Ukraine is emphatically not the place for aggressive driving or attempts to demonstrate one’s courage behind the wheel. A civilian evacuation driver has precious cargo — human beings — and should drive accordingly.

Volunteers should also possess emotional resilience. Evacuation work may expose a person to damaged communities and people undergoing some of the worst days of their lives. The appropriate response is neither emotional indifference nor theatrical anguish. It is compassion combined with sufficient psychological steadiness to remain useful.

Some knowledge of Ukrainian is obviously advantageous, although international volunteers may also have useful roles depending upon the composition of individual teams. First-aid knowledge, previous humanitarian experience, mechanical competence and experience driving larger vehicles may all be valuable. None of these things, however, substitutes for judgement, reliability and the ability to work constructively with others.

There is also one quality that is conspicuously unnecessary: fearlessness. Sensible people are afraid of genuinely dangerous things. Fear is one of the mechanisms by which human beings remain alive. What matters is the capacity to assess risk soberly, obey professional security decisions and continue functioning despite the knowledge that one is operating in wartime conditions.

No volunteer should be expected to undertake reckless journeys, enter active combat positions or improvise routes into areas assessed as unsafe. Civilian evacuation is humanitarian work, not a military operation. Security conditions must determine whether any particular movement proceeds, and responsible volunteers must be prepared to accept a decision that a journey cannot safely be undertaken.

Who should not volunteer?

People primarily seeking excitement should stay away. So should those who habitually ignore instructions, exaggerate their experience or imagine that courage consists of taking unnecessary risks.

The same applies to anyone whose physical condition makes prolonged travel or moderate lifting unsafe, or whose personal circumstances mean that they cannot make the necessary commitment reliably. There is no shame whatsoever in concluding that this particular form of volunteering is unsuitable. Wartime Ukraine needs useful people in hundreds of different capacities.

But for the right person, civilian evacuation work offers something unusually direct. The result of a day’s work may be very simple: several people who began the morning in danger finish the evening somewhere safer.

There are few more tangible measures of usefulness than that.

Expressions of interest

Anyone interested in participating should write to contact@development-foundation.org, providing:

• their WhatsApp number, including international dialling code; and

• a short biography of approximately 100–200 words, including relevant driving, humanitarian, first-aid, logistical or other practical experience, where applicable.

  
  

Applicants should be candid about their experience and physical capabilities. There is no advantage in exaggeration. The object is to assemble dependable people who can work together safely and effectively.

Ukraine’s war has produced extraordinary acts of courage. Yet some of its most valuable acts are remarkably ordinary — helping an old woman into a vehicle, carrying somebody’s suitcase, keeping a frightened child calm or driving carefully along a long road until the landscape outside the window finally becomes safer.

Sometimes heroism is simply making sure that somebody gets out.