Losing everything in Avdiivka

Inside the remains of his fourth floor condo, Anatoliy Karabass gradually moves around the cover of flotsam and jetsam covering his once flawless floor. As he strolls, a stumble yields a squeak. It's the sound of a youngsters' toy abandoned by one of his grandchildren.

Inside the flat, it's cold to the point that each breath he takes gathers as it leaves his body. The vapor trails off into the separation with his words. What was at one time a warm and agreeable home is presently unacceptable after an immediate hit from a 122mm shell punctured the outside divider. The windows and the overhang were likewise tore separated, successfully leaving a six-meter opening over his loft, with just a couple patches of block between.

From the center of his flat, Anatoliy can now watch out on to the tree line that sits only 500 meters away. Some place in that course is the overwhelming firearm that discharged the shell which demolished everything for which he had worked. The hints of the extraordinary battling in that course are still perceptible for the duration of the day.

"That poor old man," says his 71-year-old spouse, Elena Karabass, as she gazes over at her better half, standing heartbroken and distressed in his home. "He worked his entire life for his family, and now it's altogether gone."