“Hell yeah! Yeaaah! Done!” Boom. “Easy peasy lemon squeezy!” Dzhango from the Khyzhak brigade shouts in English. He’s just shot down a Russian FPV drone.
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Dzhango firing to shoot down a Russian FPV drone.
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A Russian drone waiting on the road after being shot by a mobile firing crew.
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Dzhango, a shooter, gets ready before the daily shift.
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Dzhango loads a magazine while brushing his teeth in the dugout before the daily shift. Inside the dugout of the mobile firing crew of the Khyzhak brigade.
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Young and Dzhango taking a break after the shift.
A small moving target that wants to kill you is a challenge with an asterisk. I don’t manage to photograph the drone above us, but I’m glad Dzhango shoots more accurately. The usual rule for everyone else is to stay under cover and not stick your head out.
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The remains of burned vehicles on the road.
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A ground robot returning from a logistics mission.
The tasks of Dzhango’s mobile fire group are different – to stand watch and shoot down Russian drones. The H20 highway runs from the frontline city of Kramatorsk to the battlefield in Kostyantynivka in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. This last road always becomes either the “road of life” or the “road of death.” Drone warfare is deadly simple – everything flies toward the road; any movement is a target. Us too.
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The moon over the road.
The road is covered with scars: FPV drones, cluster munitions, artillery, glide bombs – a map of modern war. Pears on the ground are tangled with fiber-optic cable – this harvest won’t be gathered. Anti-drone nets fall onto a highway strewn with burned-out ground robots, pickup trucks, and armored vehicles. Donetsk is crumbling before my eyes.
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A Russian fiber-optic drone flies above the mobile firing crew. Dzhango loads a magazine during the shift.
The fighters of the Khyzhak brigade are police patrol officers who joined up. The five of them share a dugout with Zhuzha, a dog that came to them in search of food and cuddles. A shower, a washbasin, a kitchen, even a plasma TV playing Michael Jackson’s “They Don’t Care About Us” – a parallel universe built underground. The peace sign on Jackson’s T-shirt contrasts with the sound of loading magazines.
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The mobile firing unit of the Khyzhak brigade on duty.
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Soldiers from the Khyzhak brigade fire on a Russian drone during the rotation. Borya, a shooter on duty.
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Soldiers stop for a quick chat – they use scooters to drive between positions.
Above, the kill zone, which lives by its own rules: food and water are delivered by ground robots, via electric scooters, or through the sky while Ukrainian Vampire drones carry supply packages above.
“We try as much as possible to shoot down whatever is flying toward us. We understand that it’s someone’s ground robot, or someone’s car, or even – someone’s life,” Dzhango tells me. He is 31, from Chernivtsi, which is more than 1,000 km away.
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Dzhango and Young during a shift.
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Dzhango near the ruins of a home.
In the morning he talks to his family on a video call – on the screen there’s a beach, white sand, colorful umbrellas, his son – a parallel world. “What I miss most is my family, my child … living through the coolest moments of his childhood from a distance. His first baby teeth fell out! And I wanted to pull them out with a string, as my father did.”
His son knows exactly what Dzhango’s job looks like and asks: “Bring me an FPV!”
Dzhango does not bring FPVs home.
His son’sHis birthday is tattooed on his right arm. On the left, there’s a long scar and a tattoo that reads: “Jump off the cliff and wings will grow.” It reminds him of his father’s advice and of a police shift in Chernivtsi, where he was wounded – hit by three bullets – and his 22-year-old colleague, Taisiia Tataryn, was killed. After a long recovery, he joined a combat unit.
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Young and Dzhango pass a burned-out scooter. A soldier was injured while riding it and was evacuated from the combat zone. Fiber optic cable lies mixed with pears on the ground in Donetsk region.
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Remains of a shot-down Russian FPV drone.
Every morning we walk the same streets and tree lines, but the landscape keeps changing – fresh craters, fallen trees, smoke on the horizon. The wreckage of drones and munitions maps the area – here, a Molniya, a Russian kamikaze drone, is stuck in a tree.
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The body of a civilian covered with plastic sheeting near the road to Kostyantynivka. The body of a Ukrainian soldier – which was recovered a few days later.
Here – since the start of July – a dead civilian has been lying under a black plastic bag. A bit further on, there’s a soldier from a neighboring unit; his body will be evacuated in a couple of days. In the tree line, there’s a burned scooter, hit by an FPV drone; a fighter from another unit was evacuated, but the soldiers will say he died in the hospital that night.
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Soldiers driving a buggy at high speed, risking being spotted by a drone.
“Something’s flying!” – within seconds, the guys start shooting. Dzhango’s comrade, 41-year-old Young, links every successful shoot-down to adrenaline and a rush. He served almost eight years in the police and nearly two years in the Khyzhak brigade.
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Young, a shooter from the Khyzhak brigade, on duty with the mobile firing crew.
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Young collecting apricots by the road. Young taking a break.
On his very first combat mission, two small fragments hit him; he calls it luck. On the next one, an FPV drone hit the side window of his armored vehicle – the shaped charge flew inside. “A flash behind me – out of the corner of my eye, I see something explode inside. Sparks, smoke, you can’t see anything, it’s impossible to breathe,” he recalls.
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One of his brothers-in-arms died instantly; a second was seriously wounded: “I guess the shaped charge passed through him, then hit the floor where another fighter was sitting… And it exploded between his legs.”
Now his job is to make sure another FPV doesn’t reach his comrades’ vehicle.
The only intact building among the erased skeletons of houses is the church.
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Dzhango lighting a candle in a damaged church.
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Holy images inside the damaged church near the road to Kostyantynivka.
A blue eye looks out. Some of the saints are on the floor, others remain by the altar. Dzhango lights a candle – according to tradition, a candle is lit either for the health of the living or for the repose of those who have passed. Half an hour later, artillery shelling begins, and the church comes under fire. A week later, I get a short message: “The church burned down.”
While waiting for the rotation out, we sit along the highway on scattered chairs and stools under the dense cover of the trees.
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Tsygan from the Khyzhak brigade is driving soldiers for rotation on the road towards Kostyantynivka, Donetsk region.
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Soldiers from the Khyzhak brigade after the rotation.
Dzhango plays Madonna’s “Music” from his phone, then Justin Timberlake’s “Mirrors,” and dances a little. From time to time, he pauses – to stop and listen, whether something is coming.He’s flying. Then he turns the music back on and sings along again. Even in abnormal circumstances, inside a war, at least you can always choose the soundtrack.
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The road to Kostyantynivka covered with anti-drone nets
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A sunset over the road to Kostyantynivka
The next day, Dzhango will write saying they shot down another nine drones. And then he’ll send a video of how another morning in the dugout began with “Good Morning, good morning to you” from the musical Singin’ in the Rain. “Easy peasy lemon squeezy!” he said.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of FAQs based on the photo essay topic ranging from basic context to deeper analysis
General Context Questions
Q What is the life or death highway in Donetsk
A Its the main road used to supply the frontline town of Chasiv Yar and nearby Ukrainian positions Because its constantly shelled by Russian forces every trip down it is incredibly dangeroushence the nickname
Q Who is the Khyzhak brigade
A Khyzhak means Predator in Ukrainian Its a National Guard brigade currently tasked with defending the area around the highway and holding the line against Russian advances
Q Why is this specific road so important
A Its the last major paved route that connects the rear supply hubs to the frontline troops If the road is cut off Ukrainian forces would have to be resupplied by smaller slower dirt roads which would make it nearly impossible to hold the city
Q Is this photo essay showing new events or old ones
A The photos capture the current ongoing reality of the war The situation on this road has been critical for months and the essay documents the daily grind of that reality right now
The Photo Essay Content
Q What kind of photos are in the essay
A The photos are raw and documentarystyle They show the destroyed vehicles on the roadside the exhausted faces of the soldiers the smoke from constant shelling and the tense moments of driving at high speed through open ground
Q What is the main feeling or message the photos try to convey
A The main message is the sheer desperation and exhaustion of the defenders Its not about glory its about survival The photos show the psychological toll and the high cost of keeping the supply line open
Q Does the essay interview the soldiers or is it just pictures
A The essay combines powerful photos with short captions and quotes from the soldiers of the Khyzhak brigade giving a firsthand account of what they are thinking as they make these runs
Q Are the photos graphic or violent
