It’s mud season again in Ukraine. Farm tracks leading to the front lines are churned into slippery swamps, armoured vehicles founder, soldiers slip and fall and sometimes break bones
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitask“The rain feels like needles on every part of your body; you are pouring water out of your boots,” says Andriy, a Ukrainian unit commander in the province of Luhansk. His poncho is his most treasured piece of kit. “I love it, I could write a book about it.” By day, it keeps the rain off; at night he stretches it into a canopy above his foxhole.
It rained almost solidly through October and several soldiers were evacuated with flu and other ailments caused by the wet, cold conditions. For several days Andriy ran a fever and his kidneys ached. He struggled on, glugging flu-remedy drinks, but at last his commander insisted that he was evacuated. Doctors tell him he has an inflammation of his kidneys and should go to hospital; he hopes a few nights’ sleep in warm and dry conditions will clear it up so that he can return to his unit.
The mud makes evacuating the wounded a nightmare. Last week an ambulance slipped down a verge into the river . “And mud [can transmit] infection,” says Mr Zholob. Tetanus cases have spiked. “If a wounded soldier has to wait four or five or six hours to be evacuated, little wounds can become big problems.”
Tactics change. “When the leaves fall it is possible to see the enemy [from farther away] and observe him more closely,” says Colonel Zhdanov. “Without leaf cover it is harder to move, there are fewer ambushes, battles tend to be conducted at longer distances, relying more on artillery.”
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