Imagine driving towards extreme danger to rescue civilians under fire on Ukraine’s eastern front. Imagine doing that day after day, year after year, in blazing summers and biting winters, knowing that each morning you might not return, and that your friends have been severely injured or killed doing this work.
This month marks five years since local search and rescue group Roza na Ruke was set up in the city of Kharkiv by Sasha Humaniuk. Locals came together to search for a missing young woman who had a rose tattooed on her hand. Roza na Ruke means “Rose on Hand”. A few months later, Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and pushed up to the city’s suburbs. It has bombarded Kharkiv with missiles ever since.
According to local media, Russian attacks have killed more than 450 civilians in the Kharkiv region so far in 2026.
In the early days of the invasion, Roza na Ruke reported distributing over a million humanitarian kits and hot meals to the vulnerable. It also uses its search and rescue skills to help first responders when the city is attacked by missiles. This week, Sasha Humaniuk had his hand severely cut by glass in a rescue operation following the bombing of the city.
But the group's main focus is evacuating civilians from the frontline, which runs a jagged 800 miles north to south. The frontline hasn’t changed much in the past couple of years, but advances in lethal drone technology mean that those living 20 miles or more from the line are now at risk of being killed. Vulnerable people, mostly elderly, still living in communities there are in serious, continual danger.
Roza na Ruke and other organizations drive to their homes, despite the risk, and evacuate them to the relative safety of Kharkiv. The danger is very real. Two years ago Tigran Galustyan of the team was targeted and killed by a Russian drone while going to evacuate people. Last December, so was Slava Ilchenko, another evacuation activist.
I have joined the evacuation activists dozens of times over the last few years, picking up people in communities under fire, and have seen first-hand the danger, and the exhaustion, volunteers face. Working with an assortment of often battered vehicles, the team estimates that since February 2022 it has evacuated more than 21,000 people, including thousands of children.
This is remarkable work, largely unseen and unappreciated by international organizations and donors who rarely venture further east than the capital of Kyiv. Raising funds is always a huge challenge.
Locally, volunteers are held in enormous esteem, and people understand the risks they take for others. But the physical and psychological pressure on the Roza na Ruke team is immense, the knowing that if they don’t continue, more people will die.
The winter is approaching. Everything is harder in the extreme cold. As international headlines feature the new deal to supply Russian diesel to the U.S., and what this means for peace talks, Sasha Humaniuk and the Roza na Ruke activists are working out who they will evacuate this coming week. “The greatest value of a person's life is the possibility of change the world for the better,” says Humaniuk simply.
You can support their work with a Paypal donation to Troyandanaruci@gmail.com.
