Russia’s Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. On March 8, an assignment went north near the city of Chernihiv. All four helicopters of the squadron completed the mission. But as they were returning to their base near Kyiv, Chyzh noticed new enemy positions beneath them. It was too late. Three of the helicopters were hit by enemy fire and crashed. Chyzh and Pepeliashko were the only survivors.
“I remember waking up cold and in pain,” Chyzh told CNN, speaking at the capital’s hospital, where both men are recovering from their injuries.
“I saw the wreckage of the helicopter and smelled fuel,” said Pepeliashko. “My leg was turned to the other side.”
Both pilots had broken legs and Pepeliashko suffered fractures to his spine from the impact of the crash.
He tried to crawl forward but dived in and out of his senses. Then he saw several Russian soldiers appear.
“I begged them to shoot me. “I was sure they had come to kill us.”

The first Ukrainian helicopter pilots were captured

That day, Chyzh and Pepeliashko became the first Ukrainian helicopter pilots to be captured by the Russians, according to the Ukrainian military. Their narratives of captivity are painful and the ill-treatment they claim would be contrary to international conventions on the treatment of prisoners of war.
The two pilots say they were loaded into an armored personnel carrier and taken to a field hospital and then taken to a hospital in the Russian city of Rylsk, just across the border.
In the early days of their captivity, Chyzh says he was forced to read a statement to the camera that he was doing well, receiving medical treatment and that he was against the war. The statement was later uploaded to YouTube. “I was warned that if I did not read the statement, I would not be treated (and that) my legs would start to tremble and be amputated.”
Chyzh says he was also told that if he did not comply, his co-pilot would not receive medical treatment and would probably be dead by morning.
For almost two weeks, both pilots could not move, stuck in bed from their injuries.
They say they were questioned daily about Ukrainian army positions, how many Russians they had killed, the location of biological laboratories and where the “Nazis” were hiding.
According to the Geneva Conventions, interrogation is legal but “subject to the prohibition of torture and coercion … as well as the requirement of humane treatment”. At one point Chyzh said he was pressured to obtain Russian citizenship.
“They asked me: ‘Why do you want to go back to Ukraine? Look at how big and powerful Russia is. There are so many opportunities here,’” Chyzh told CNN, noting the irony of hearing it in a hospital room where a dirty sheet of paper covered it. a broken window.
But Pepeliashko says he was also moved by the compassion of some of the medical staff, who provided them with new clothes.
“Even among bad people there is always someone who has a slightly kinder heart,” he said.

Prison and propaganda

After the operation, they were transferred to a prisoner of war camp. they do not know where.
“They put us in a tent for injured prisoners. They only gave us a small cup of water every day. The worst thing for me was that I could not even wash my hands. Only on the eighth day they gave me a pack of wet wipes to clean it. “myself,” says Chyzh.
The pilots remember hearing screams of pain from other scenes. The tents were frozen, they said, and kept burning by burning books.
After three weeks they were transferred again – to a prison in the Russian city of Kursk. There was no separation between wounded and healthy prisoners. Everyone was beaten, Chyzh claims.
They asked: “How many of us have you shot down, bastard?”. There were about 30 people in the room. “I had to stand there without crutches and I had to undress and dress myself,” according to Chyzh.
Pepeliashko remembers lying on the floor trying to make eye contact with a middle-aged woman who was among the guards.
“I hoped that looking her in the eye, she would awaken her maternal instinct and tell everyone to stop beating her. But that did not happen. There was a gap in her eyes. They wanted to prove to us that we are nothing. They wanted us to stop respecting him. ourselves”.
Pepeliashko says it was the deepest moment of his despair. “I thought: My God, do you not hear me at all?
They even tore the cross he wore around his neck, he said. “” Why do you need a cross? “There is no God here,” they said.
Their time in prison was colored by a constant flood of Russian propaganda and brainwashing efforts on the detainees, both pilots said. Throughout the day, a radio in their cell broadcast propaganda and lectures on Stepan Bandera – a Ukrainian nationalist who collaborated with Nazi Germany and was assassinated by the KGB after World War II, and whose followers fought so hard. the Nazis as well as the Soviets.
The women detained by Ukraine in an adjoining cell were forced to sing the Russian national anthem and old Soviet songs, the two pilots said.
CNN asked the Russian Ministry of Defense to comment on the allegations of the two pilots, but received no response.

Exchange of prisoners

Chyzh and Pepeliashko say they survived the ordeal by imagining that they were in a different place, maintaining a sense of humor and dreaming of what they would do in the future, as they clung to the hope that they would be exchanged at some point.
“We shared recipes in great detail, we gave each other lectures on many different topics. I remember Oleksii talking about the visit to Paris. I closed my eyes and imagined myself there. Then I promised myself that if I survived the “I would definitely go to Paris in captivity. It distracted me from the pain,” Pepeliashko said.
In mid-April, the two said they would trade with Russian prisoners of war. They did not believe it until they finally arrived in Kyiv on April 14.
At the time of their capture, they had been told that Kyiv had been “liberated” from Russia. They had no idea that the battle for Kyiv was never actually fought – and that the Russians had finally left the region to refocus their efforts on eastern Ukraine. Rehabilitation will be a long journey for both of them. Chyzh is still struggling to walk on crutches. He told CNN that for him the hospital was now home. “This is what I have. I have nothing else.”
They are obviously happy to live and see their families again, but the war still weighs on their minds. They worry about their comrades still flying dangerous missions.
It’s not yet time for the trip to Paris – both pilots say they want to return to the race.
“We did not go through this hell to give up,” Pepeliashko said. “Our whole life is the road to heaven. And we will do everything to get back to the cockpit of the helicopter.”