Seventeen-year-old Anastasiia Ryvbalchenko narrowly escaped danger during her recent journey home. She and her fellow passengers had to abandon their train at 4am on 16 September while travelling from Odesa to Kirovohrad.
“On my way to Odesa, there had been a lot of evacuations, and now on my way back, it was happening again,” she said, expressing her frustration. “I was already thinking that if there was another evacuation, I just couldn’t take it any more.”
An hour and a half later, as they waited in the dark, a drone struck nearby. “There was an extremely loud explosion, and everyone started running into the woods,” she recounted. Fortunately, the train was undamaged, but with further explosions brightening the night sky, Anastasiia decided to leave and continued her journey on foot until her parents picked her up. “I’m not going to travel by train anymore,” she said.
Anastasiia’s experience, while intense, is not unique. Delays, both brief and prolonged, have become the norm for train travellers. Since Russian drones began targeting moving passenger trains in late 2025, many passengers now routinely leave their trains, check Telegram for updates on drone and missile attacks, and alert friends and family about delays.
