“At the moment of the nightmare, I managed to hide”

The director of the Donetsk library spoke about the massive strike on the city

Donetsk cultural institutions operate in remote mode – this helps to protect visitors, as well as staff. Nevertheless, individual employees still find themselves at the workplace at the time of “arrivals” around the city. This was also the case last Sunday, when a strike was recorded in the center, as a result of which at least seven people were injured, and several buildings were destroyed or damaged. One of the shells then hit the roof of the largest library in the DPR. About the terrible minutes that she had to endure, Marina Morozova, deputy director of the Donetsk Republican Library. Krupskaya.

– On February 19, while on duty, at 14:15 in the afternoon, I heard that explosions were heard somewhere not far from us. At 14:30 there was a whistle of a projectile, and then a roar from an explosion from above. You can hear glass from broken windows falling over the main entrance. The fire alarm went off, but soon it stopped ringing. There was an ominous silence and the expectation of a new arrival. Fear, horror, and self-preservation worked at the same time.

– Have you managed to get to a safe place?

– At the time of this nightmare, I managed to hide in the dressing room of the wardrobe, where there are blank walls and no window frames. Everything happened instantly and unexpectedly.

– Were there other employees in the building besides you?

– Only a cloakroom attendant who changes the watchman during the day. Since December 5, the team has been transferred to remote work, they go out only to solve those tasks that can only be performed in the library.

“For what? Why shoot it all? What will the destruction of the apartment of a grandmother living in Donetsk on the 5th floor of a house on Shevchenko Boulevard give? And what will get into the dome of the library give?” asks the director of the Donetsk Philharmonic Alexander Paretsky.

But there is no answer to this question. In his personal telegram channel, Paretsky lists the objects attacked: a nursery, a kindergarten, a specialized school, a shopping center, a city market, a bus station, a university dormitory, apartment buildings, private houses, parked cars.

As you can see, there are no military airfields, tank ranges and weapons depots among the above. The only non-purely “civilian” point on the map where the Ukrainian forces did end up is the Prosecutor General’s Office.

The poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko in 1961 considered it possible to “turn to our government with a request.” The topic was different then, but his experience can be inherited. In this case, until the situation stabilizes, prohibit the presence of people in the workplace, entrusting the safety of premises, funds and meetings to automatic security systems. On the scales, the value of human life, at least for a few months, should outweigh the value of objects of material culture.