“We began to lift people up”: a high school student told how he led the public out of Crocus

So far, six guys have been awarded: Islam Khalilov, Artemy Filimonov, Victoria Volchikhina, Nikita Ivanov, Alexander Zhurik and his girlfriend Elizaveta Terekhova. But, as they themselves say, other guys were also working at Crocus that terrible evening. Lisa led the victims out of the hall along the fire escapes, Victoria and Alexander opened the doors to the service premises. The high school students not only led people out of the building, calmed them down and took them to a safe distance to the Vegas shopping center, but also did not leave the scene of the tragedy until late at night, expecting that someone else would need their help.

One of them, 16-year-old Alexander Zhurik, is a tenth-grader at Moscow school No. 1191. He studies in a physics and mathematics class, so after graduation he plans to enter some technical university, but has not yet chosen which one.

Sasha was working that evening at Crocus City Hall in the cloakroom on the minus 1st floor together with Victoria Volchikhina. During a terrorist attack, he and his colleagues led groups of people out of Crocus, bypassing the militants.

I got a job at Crocus on New Year’s Eve 2024, that is, at the end of December,” Alexander told MK. – I learned about this vacancy from friends who already worked there, and that’s how I got there.

Another thing that worked in favor of this place of work was the fact that it is very convenient for Sasha to get to it – ten minutes by metro.

On March 22, the shift began as usual. The guys arrived at Crocus at 17:45, and by 18:00 they had already started working. At 18-30 they started letting people in, the audience had already begun to gather for the concert.

Everything went as usual, we joked, everything was fine, but at some point a shot rang out,” continues Alexander. – This happened 10-15 minutes before the start of the concert. By this time there were already a lot of people in the lobby. At first no one understood what was happening, and I didn’t understand either. Then we heard another shot, and another, and another… And then people began to understand what was happening, including me.

Alexander says that after he realized that they were attacked by terrorists, a picture immediately appeared in his head, since literally two weeks before they were instructed on how to act in such situations. “I immediately remembered this briefing,” he says. “I think he helped us, helped us make the right decision faster and not get confused.”

– Did you feel a sense of fear at that moment?

– No, I wasn’t scared. I immediately left my post and ran to the crowd of people with the goal of somehow helping them. There was a stampede there, they began to press on me, because there were a lot of people. Everyone ran to the service door, and the door was small… In the end, I was pressed against the wardrobe counter, and I climbed over it. I saw people hiding behind columns, behind wardrobe racks. My partner and I began to lift people up and began calling them to follow us to the service door. For example, there was one woman who refused to get up, she said that she would not go anywhere, since she was safer in this place… Other people got up and walked to the service door, someone was hiding among jackets in the wardrobe… We directed them all to the service door.

When we had collected almost all the people who were hiding in the wardrobe, we led them to the service door and waited for them all to go through it. Opposite this door, literally a couple of meters away, there is a staircase to the first floor. It was the most terrible moment, because we were standing, waiting for all the people to enter the office building, and while we were waiting, I stood and looked at these stairs, and there, on the first floor, shots were heard. At that moment it was really very scary, because there was a thought in my head that terrorists could come down those stairs at any moment. And my partner and I and all these people who were next to us, in full view… And we could have been killed.

Then Sasha says, “but in the end, thank God, everything worked out,” the people entered the office building, and he followed them in.

Then, on the instructions of our shift leader, I led everyone out into the street. I shouted to them: “Follow me!”, and they ran after me. I saw a lot of people on the street as they came out of different exits. Everyone was terrified. Everyone was running somewhere, shouting something… Many did not understand where to run. I stood in front of them and began to direct them towards the neighboring shopping centers. There were people who were going the wrong way, and I coordinated them. In this way, I tried to help people, like all the guys who worked that day.

– When were you able to leave there?

– After some time, I met my girlfriend, who also worked there, and we started leaving together. Elizabeth was in the hall, and I was in the wardrobe, so we were not together. We crossed the bridge, went to the Pavshinskaya floodplain and from there we walked on foot to Krasnogorsk, boarded a bus there, drove home, that’s all.

– You were probably terribly worried about Lisa?

– Yes, I was very worried, I had thoughts of running on it, but since I was on the minus 1st floor, the terrorists were on the 1st floor, and Lisa was on the 2nd floor, I understood that if I went to her, I could die myself, so I decided to go outside and look for her there. In the end, everything ended well, Lisa came out of another exit, and we met.

– What can you say now, five days after the terrorist attack?

– Every day it becomes harder and harder mentally, because in the first days it was, of course, very scary, heavy on the soul, but there was still no full understanding of what happened. Now this whole picture constantly pops up in my head. It’s hard to accept this and realize that so many people died that not everyone managed to escape. I don’t think I’ll be getting a job anywhere anytime soon, so far this is a serious injury for me. For now I won’t be able to work.

…Young heroes were awarded on March 27 by Nina Ostanina (Communist Party of the Russian Federation), Vice-Speaker of the State Duma Anna Kuznetsova (United Russia) and Yana Lantratova (SRZP). Each of the young heroes was presented with laptops and letters of gratitude from the Duma Committee for Family Protection. The deputies expressed gratitude not only to the courageous high school students themselves, but also to their families who raised such wonderful children.