KOSTYANTYNIVKA, Ukraine — The buzz of drones fills the air in the city of Kostyantynivka as residents scramble to take cover.
The unmanned vehicles are identified as Russian Shaheds. Moments later, an explosion leaves a building in ruins.
Located north of Donetsk, Kostyantynivka remains a Ukrainian stronghold near the front lines of the war. But as attacks like this one ramp up, residents who had counted on the fighting bypassing them are starting to give up hope.
“The situation is terrible. That’s why we’re leaving. They kept bombing us,” said Lyudmila, a resident who was evacuating the city with her cat. “We stayed for too long and almost got ourselves killed.”
“So many of our guys have been killed,” said Olena, riding alongside Lyudmila. “My friend insisted I should go. She has already left.”
The two women received assistance from Proliska, a humanitarian NGO tasked with helping civilians relocate out of frontline zones.
Yevhen Tkachev, head of the group’s humanitarian center in Donetsk, was coordinating the evacuation efforts. He described a deteriorating security situation in Kostyantynivka, where some 8,000 people remain, compared with a prewar population of 60,000.
“They attack with glide bombs all the time, even outside curfew hours when people are going about their business,” Tkachev said. “Residential buildings are being bombed. FPV [first-person view] drones are on the hunt in the suburbs. There are also Shahed-type drones.”
The attacks on civilian targets appear to serve a Russian objective of depopulating the area, leaving cities largely abandoned and clearing the way for troops to advance.
But residents are still reluctant to leave their homes, even as the destruction spreads around them.
Some are simply unable to leave on their own. Tkachev and other humanitarian workers go door-to-door in residential neighborhoods, finding people who need assistance and offering them the chance to leave.
The organization provides specialized vehicles to help disabled residents evacuate.
“Today, as always, we were working in extreme circumstances,” Tkachev said. “There were bombs exploding and drones hovering. But with God’s help, we made five rounds and evacuated 13 people.”
One resident, Lydia, was in tears as she acknowledged that it was time to leave, saying, “We stayed here too long.”
Another resident named Lyubov said the city had come under “one strike after another,” but she had remained in place until Proliska offered assistance.
Asked why she had waited so long to leave, Lyubov said, “I have nowhere to go. No one is waiting for me.”
