Stus Saved Him While in Captivity: The Story of “Medic” Serhiy Kovalyov, “Bison,” Who Escaped from Azovstal, Survived a Russian Prison with a Bullet in His Heart, and Returned to His Home Bat
Source: Novynarnia
Author: Myroslava Malyk
This is the story of medic Serhiy Kovalyov, call sign “Bison,” who endured the hell of Mariupol, three and a half years of Russian captivity, and returned to a life of freedom weighing just 42 kilograms.
This is the story of a man who was supposed to die as a child from a heart defect but survived shelling and torture with a Russian bullet lodged in his own myocardium.
Following his heart’s calling, Serhiy Kovalyov continues to help people through the battalion’s support service, because he understands better than anyone that while a person may face great trials in war, one must always choose life.
The Choice to Be Ukrainian
Lviv, 1988. Two boys share the space on a stair landing. Serhiyko is a frail child. Because of a heart defect, he doesn’t go to school; teachers come to him instead. Next to him is his neighbor, Nazarchik.
Serhiyko, the son of a Soviet air defense officer, diligently draws tanks with red stars. Nazar, on the other hand, draws insurgents and tridents—he has known history since childhood from his grandmother, a UPA liaison. A friendship blossoms between the neighbors. A few years later, Nazar lets his friend read *Kobzar*—the seed falls on fertile ground.
Thirty-seven years later, Nazar walks into a ward at a Kyiv hospital. There, he finds that very same childhood friend. They still live in the same apartment building. It’s just that Nazar hadn’t seen his neighbor for three and a half years.
41-year-old Serhiy Kovalyov spent those years in Russian captivity. His captors try to strip him of his Ukrainian identity.
Serhiy not only endures the full brunt of Dostoevsky’s suffering on his own body while in captivity, but also the moral oppression stemming from his identity. His tormentors have failed to shake his belief that people are fighting for his release.
August 24, 2025. The base of the “Hospitaliers” medical battalion. Volunteers and the families of the fallen have gathered to celebrate Independence Day. A ceremony is underway to honor those who save the lives of soldiers on the front lines. Battalion Commander Yana Zinkevich receives a phone call. Serhiy Kovalov, “Bizon,” speaks into the receiver. He has returned.
The struggle is worth every effort!
One can be born for war at any age
The 1990s. Serhiyko grows up, soaking up knowledge about the world, people, Soviet idols, and what those idols are capable of. He learns about the prison on Lontskogo Street and the fates of the people who were left to rot there. This story unfolded right here, just a few blocks from his native Sykhiv. He remembers the day—August 24—when the whole building roared and chanted: Ukraine has gained independence!
Life hasn’t been kind to the young man. A severe heart defect could trigger clinical death at any moment. Serhii undergoes three complex surgeries. During one of them, a mistake by the anesthesiologist leaves him in a coma for two weeks.
Due to his health condition, the young man is unfit for military service.
Serhiy earns a law degree, but he quickly grows bored with his profession. He switches to the construction industry—installing structured cabling networks. He quickly becomes the head of his own company. Business is going well, but a major crisis is brewing in the country.
November 30, 2013. “Berkut” security forces beat students with batons and their feet as they gathered on Independence Square to protest the Yanukovych regime. That night became a turning point: Maidan turned into the Revolution of Dignity.
This event also marked a “before” and “after” in the life of Serhiy, a resident of Lviv.
While running his business, he became an active patriot: he went on combat missions with volunteer battalions, engaged in patriotic education of youth through the “Trukhanivska Sich” organization, and cared for the families of the Heroes of the Heavenly Hundred. He participated in hearings regarding Maidan-related cases. Eventually, he devoted himself entirely to volunteer work, closing his construction firm.
In 2018, Serhiy Kovalyov met Yana Zinkevych and joined the “Hospitaliers” battalion. After completing a rotation, Bizon is now undergoing training. He travels to the Mariupol sector for all his rotations. He is stationed at the “Muraha” position, located between Shyrokyne and Vodyane. At this time, Vodyane is considered the hottest spot along the entire line of contact.
Bizon likes to stay on rotation for long periods, spending months on the front lines. He cleared a unique path through the minefields to rescue the wounded and carefully protects this route from the wheels of Ukrainian Armed Forces vehicles, reserving it solely for evacuations across the local rough terrain.
A paramedic knows no fatigue when faced with another’s pain
Summer 2021, Vodyane. In the gray zone, beyond the line of trenches—a wounded Azov soldier. The enemy mowed him down with machine gun fire: his buttocks shattered, his leg wounded, his cheek pierced. Bizon struggles to pull the soldier out, but doesn’t succeed right away—55 kilograms versus over 100.
The young man is unable to move and, lying on his back, begins to choke on his own blood.
“I’m dragging him on my back and praying, crying, laughing, throwing up—and I keep dragging him, crawling on all fours. It’s a good thing the grass is tall,” says Bizon.
When enemy artillery starts shelling them, the entire defensive line takes cover. Over the radio—a rumble, curses, and an order from the platoon ensign of the 128th: “Fire shells at ‘Sapoga’! Bizon is pulling our guys out from under fire there!”
Serhiy is moved: “I’m a civilian. I’m not one of them. But it moved me so deeply to see how much these guys care about my life!”
He regularly risks his life in dangerous situations. He feels he must be with the fighters to give the defenders a chance to survive after being wounded.
The eyes of the women with infants from the Drama Theater will remain in his heart forever
Winter 2021. Bizon spends New Year’s Eve at his post. On Christmas, he manages to slip away home—to his mother and son. But by February 7, he returns to the front lines.
A major war is looming.
Events unfold rapidly: On February 10, massive artillery barrages begin, and on February 25, air strikes are added to the assault. By February 27, they were retreating toward Mariupol, having first established a foothold in Volontyrivka. The village is situated on a hill, which turned out to be an ideal position for mortar fire.
“Our team, aside from providing medical care, has been actively participating in the fighting from the very first days, and soon we received a direct order to move into the territory of the 503rd Battalion with a mortar,” Serhiy says.
The Marines set up a triage station in the maternity hospital in Volontyrivka. Women are evacuated from there, while wounded soldiers are brought in. Once stabilized, they are transported to the Mariupol hospital. In one of the maternity hospital’s rooms, Bizon finds a stockpile of baby boxes.
“I used to deliver groceries to the Drama Theater and saw that women with children lacked everything: diapers, baby food. I loaded up everything I could find—I filled the whole car with baby boxes,” recalls Bizon.
The women are thrilled—the boxes contain everything the babies need.
Bizon delivers aid to the new mothers the day before Russia’s airstrike on the theater, which claimed the lives of hundreds of people.
The faces of those who ended up in a mass grave beneath the concrete slabs will stay with Bizon forever.
“We have to get out before dawn, or we’ll be hit by a massive airstrike.”
The road from Vodyanoye to Mariupol is becoming a real ordeal. Enemy artillery is mercilessly shelling the village, and at the only exit—an intersection that cannot be bypassed—the occupiers dropped a half-metric-ton aerial bomb. The crater is as deep as a five-story building.
They set out at night, without a single headlight in sight. Serhiy is behind the wheel of a “Mitsubishi L200,” which has only its rear axle working. Inside the cab, besides him, is a crew of medics: “Borisivna,” “Ptashka,” and “Drim,” and the cargo bed is packed to the brim with medical supplies.
Attached to a tow rope, the “Bizon” is pulling a “UAZ” that won’t start—the battery is dead. Inside that “UAZ” are four Marine mortarmen with two mortars and a full ammunition load.
There is no road to speak of—under the wheels lies a solid mass of rocks and debris from destroyed buildings. The overloaded trailer scrapes the ground with its undercarriage, catching on every pothole. To make out at least something in the pitch-black darkness, Bizon briefly turns on his flashlight, shielding the light with his hand so the enemy won’t spot it.
It takes four hours to cover these two kilometers.
“I knew we had to get out before dawn, or else we’d be hit by a massive airstrike,” the soldier says.
He drove off.
“The blast wave threw us right onto the wounded”
While on duty at the radio station, Bizon hears a desperate cry for help. Stepping out of the bunker, he sees a 20-year-old driver—the only member of the anti-aircraft gun crew who remained unharmed. Their anti-aircraft gun had just been hit by an enemy anti-tank guided missile. The consequences were catastrophic: the commander lost both legs and an arm, the gunner lost an arm, and the mechanic lost an arm and a leg.
They have to rescue the wounded under critical conditions. Three hundred meters away, a truck is on fire, and its ammunition—cartridges, grenades, and shells—is detonating nonstop. Borisovna, on her knees, tries to help the wounded man. Bizon struggles to place another soldier on a stretcher. At that very moment, an enemy tank opens fire with direct fire. Red-hot coals, pieces of metal, and burning slag fly all around.
“The blast wave threw us right onto the wounded. But it felt as if someone had covered us with an armored glass dome: everything within a meter’s radius was burning and exploding, yet we didn’t have a single scratch or a single piece of shrapnel,” says Bizon.
Firing at the enemy with a bullet in his chest
They plan their trip to the Illich Plant by marking their vehicles with white “Z”s. The crew heads to the assembly point, where Ptashka is already at the stabilization post.
On the way, the Russians open fire on the car. A burst of gunfire hits the right side, completely destroying the engine compartment. One of the bullets pierces the car’s armor and strikes Bizon in the chest.
“The metal tip passed between the armor plate and his body, entered his right sternum, and pierced his lung,” Serhiy states.
At this critical moment, Borisivna opens fire from the vehicle in return.
Despite his serious injury, Bizon tumbles out of the driver’s door and continues fighting.
A few minutes later, a “motorized unit” arrives. He is evacuated from under fire. Medics from the 36th Brigade and mortar crew members, having applied a pressure bandage, transport him to the bunker. There, they administer a Tranex injection to stop the internal bleeding.
His lung cavity is already filled with blood. Since they don’t have the right needle for drainage, they insert the largest catheter available—and it works.
“That bullet saved my life and the lives of my entire crew.”
On April 12, the Marine Corps commander orders a breakthrough toward Zaporizhzhia. But anyone who wants to can stay in Mariupol and head for “Azovstal.”
The first attempt to break through toward Zaporizhzhia on the night of April 12–13 fails. The occupiers destroyed the first column to set out with “Grad” rocket fire.
About 80% of the brigade—tanks, “Kozaks,” and heavy equipment—set out on that fateful advance. But Bizon doesn’t have his own “wheels”—his “Elka” broke down.
The marines gave the medics an armored “Oschadbank” cash-in-transit vehicle—a Ford Transit—in which Bizon cut a hole with an angle grinder so they could load the stretchers.
He rides in this modified vehicle until he is wounded.
“If I had gone on that breakthrough mission, both I and the entire crew would have been killed. But that bullet saved my life. And not just mine,” says Serhiy.
“I’d already pulled the pin to set off a grenade on myself… but a saving fog rolled in”
The risk of driving to Azovstal is enormous, but they can’t stay at the Illich Steel Plant any longer. All the wounded are loaded onto the vehicles, but the drivers don’t know where to go—they need an escort. Finally, they set off, but not for long—the vehicle hits a massive crater left by an aerial bomb. They can’t continue on.
“The whole convoy is moving on; we’re staying at the Illich Plant,” says Bizon.
Dawn is breaking.
They try to contact the Marines, but the radios aren’t getting through. Fortunately, in a nearby hangar, they find an abandoned “Kozak” armored vehicle—with flat tires, but equipped with a powerful “Lybid” radio.
They manage to establish contact.
“There are vehicles in the hangar—take whichever one you want, attach white flags, and head for Zaporizhzhia.
Surrender or break through. No one from ‘Azovstal’ will come back for you,” Bizon quotes the message he received. He adds: “And that’s when I realized that, as a volunteer, this prospect didn’t sit well with me. I’d already pulled out a grenade; I was about to set it off on myself, and the girls were crowding around me just as much. I’d already pulled the pin.”
But the radio comes on. “Rom” and “Palych” set out after their comrades at their own risk. They gathered about 40 people—excluding the wounded—and loaded into the “Kozak.”
Since its hydraulics were broken and the 12-metric-ton vehicle itself had flat tires, the four of them take turns turning the steering wheel to navigate around the bombed-out pipes and potholes. The drive seemed to last an eternity.
“It was broad daylight, springtime, and the sun was shining. Then suddenly, fog rolled in. And without a single shot fired, we drove into the plant’s territory,” says Bizon.
“It’s been a month since my wife died.”
They enter Azovstal on April 15. They haven’t even had time to settle in when the first alarm sounds—the enemy has broken through. Several enemy APCs and “bechs” broke through into the plant’s grounds. They managed to drive the enemy back. However, the hell still began: the enemy realized there were too many places where they could set up ambushes. There were many wounded, a constant shortage of medical supplies, and a dire food situation.
Early May. Rom enters the bunker and offers to take them up to his vehicle.
Rom is a soldier in the 36th Marine Brigade. After losing his wife—who was killed when a FAB bomb pierced the bunker—he seems to be seeking death for himself as well. He goes everywhere where there’s little chance of returning. He pulls out the wounded, retrieves the bodies of the dead, and manages to defuse the enemy corpses. And he comes back.
Bison says, “It feels like his wife was embracing him with her wings, along with everyone else who was there.”
Rom never spends the night in the bunker; instead, he always sleeps in his car, which is parked under a crane in a bombed-out hangar. After an airstrike, the hangar’s ceiling collapsed, and a concrete slab fell. It was heading toward the car but broke in half right above it. A “shelter” formed from the split concrete slab, and he sleeps in that car—the vehicle has become stationary since the area is controlled by the enemy.
Rom, inside the car, pulls out a can of sardines and a 100-gram measuring cup of alcohol.
“It’s been a month today since my wife died. Let’s remember her,” he says.
They divide the sardines among the three of them.
After the memorial, Rom unexpectedly suggests going down into the bunker, a place he usually won’t be coaxed into. They walk through a bombed-out hangar to the next one, which is relatively intact; there, rows of metal crates filled with electronics stand in order. Bizon follows Rom, with Borisovna behind them.
Suddenly, Rom stops, turns around, and holds out his hand, commanding, “Bizon, stop!”
“I press my chest against his arm and watch the scene behind him. A rocket flies into the side of the hangar, knocking out a chunk of the wall; a piece of concrete about a meter and a half in diameter flies out from that wall and sweeps away all those metal boxes, crushing them right where we were supposed to pass in a second. That chunk of concrete would have crushed us to a pulp right there,” Serhiy recounts.
Rom freezes in the dust amid the fire, staring into space with glassy eyes. A moment later—still in shock from their narrow escape—Bizon and Borisovna are already following him down, making their way over sharp shards deeper into the bunker.
He brought out the most precious thing from Olenivka—his dream
“For some time, they’d already been preparing us mentally and psychologically for captivity,” Bizon believes.
May. Convoys of trucks carrying those who, on the command’s orders, had left “Azovstal” as “honorary prisoners” set off for occupied Olenivka.
There, they are met by the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN), the FSB, and special forces. They are well-equipped, wearing helmets and body armor and carrying batons.
There is a shortage of food and water, unsanitary conditions, and above all—a severe shortage of medicine. More than 750 captives are held for over a week in a barracks designed to hold 200 people. They are later sorted and transported to other prisons.
In the barracks, the main topics of conversation are food and cars. They try not to mention their families, so as not to reopen old emotional wounds. The men spend hours discussing their culinary skills, sharing recipes for their favorite treats, and dreaming about what they’ll cook first after their release. Their plans for the future include opening their own bakeries and pizzerias. Others plan to buy trucks to transport grain.
“Everyone in the barracks has turned into a die-hard farmer!” laughs Bizon.
These dreams of a peaceful life are a true source of moral salvation for the men. Serhiy also dreams of his future home in a remote rural area.
Mandarin Propaganda
A burned-out barracks after the terrorist attack at the Olenivka
penal colony
He is being transported from Olenivka to Horlivka on July 28—the eve of the tragic execution of the “Azov” fighters. In Horlivka, Bizon has to endure yet another merciless “initiation”—a corridor of beatings and humiliation. New arrivals were “welcomed” with fists, feet, batons, and stun guns.
On New Year’s Eve, the occupiers stage a show for the TV cameras: volunteers bring mandarins to film the “humane” treatment. The prisoners are each given one peeled mandarin. And the peels are used to make compote for three more days—such are the echoes of the holiday.
When everyone is evacuated from Horlivka in a single day, due to a strange allocation principle, Bizon ends up in a prison in Torez. There he spends half a year in captivity.
With Stus on his mind and a psychopath in the same cell
From Torez, a five-day train journey begins to the Altai Krai—to Biysk. After a brutal reception, he is placed in solitary confinement with a strict schedule of beatings: in the morning and in the evening. By this point, the Rostov special forces already know that Bizon is a volunteer—and this fuels their rage.
They are forced to sing the Russian national anthem several times a day—after waking up, before every meal, and before lights out. And they have to sing loudly. In addition, strict rules apply in the cell: one must sit, the other must walk; otherwise, they’ll be beaten.
“I hum old Ukrainian Cossack songs to myself in my head. And in the darkest moments, I quote Stus to myself: ‘How good it is that I do not fear death,’ ” Serhiy shares.
These lines sustain him throughout his captivity.
Every week, Bizon is taken to so-called “interviews”—he’s tortured with electric shocks using a “tapik” in a basin of water, and a plastic bag is placed over his head until he loses consciousness.
They bring him back to consciousness with batons—and the cycle begins anew. When the standard three to four hours of torture end after just two—that’s incredible luck.
The windows have double bars—on the outside and inside—and the first set of bars is a meter away from the window. Air enters only through a narrow slit. Every day at noon, they begin taking people away for torture. They beat the “Azov” fighters and volunteers. And through that narrow slit, the cell fills with the screams and moans of those who were taken away this time.
“Enduring your own torture is easier—adrenaline helps you pull yourself together. The real test for the psyche is the daily screams of your comrades; it’s impossible to build up immunity to that. It’s a sound that’s impossible to endure,” says Bizon.
But an even greater hell begins inside the cell. For four months, he spends time face-to-face with Vadym Kovalenko, call sign “Kraken”—a chronic alcoholic and traitor to Ukraine who’d sell his soul to the devil for a cigarette.
To use the toilet, which is located right inside the cell, you have to go through a whole ritual: press a button, contact the guard on duty, and get permission. Breaking this rule is a surefire way to get beaten. They monitor everything through the cameras, and every “unauthorized” action is punished.
Kraken uses this button every time, deliberately setting Bison up for a beating whenever he hears Ukrainian coming from his mouth.
When Kraken himself lunges with his fists, Bison fights back. Afterward, he himself walks around for two weeks with bruises and contusions from the guards’ “disciplinary measures,” though his cellmate doesn’t throw any more punches.
“This Kraken guy is a former soldier; everyone there knows about him. When I tell my fellow inmates that I was in the same cell with him, they just cross themselves. They say I should get a medal for bravery—just for putting up with him and not going crazy,” “Bison” shares.
Six months before his release, in March, “Bison” dreams of his mother. She says she won’t live to see him.
“Who is this important man?”
One day, the cell door opens, and Bizon is led out—but without the usual shoves and baton blows to his spine. The detention center is supposed to transfer prisoners for transport or exchange without bruises, so hope begins to creep into his heart. However, when his hands and face are taped shut and he’s put alone in a police van, he gets scared.
From the police van, they take him to the airport in Novosibirsk. They put him on a plane and send him on a charter flight to Chelyabinsk.
“They took me to the airport, where I spent the night in the police van because, as I overheard, they couldn’t find a sober pilot over the weekend,” Serhiy says.
Finally, in the morning, they find a pilot. And he flies to Moscow on a chartered Bizon plane. On the plane, the guards can’t figure out who this important man is, the only one being transported to the Russian capital.
It later turns out that the prisoner exchange was delayed because everyone was waiting for Sergei Kovalev to arrive.
“In Moscow, they transferred me to a UAZ, in which we drove for about ten minutes, after which they led me to the second floor of a transport plane. It was there, out of the corner of my eye from under the duct tape blindfold, that I saw our other soldiers—emaciated and battered by life,” Bizon recounts.
The tension eased only once we were on Belarusian territory, when the guards began to untie the prisoners’ eyes and hands. But at that moment, the exchange nearly fell through: a civilian man lunged at a guard with a sharp object, for which he was thrown to the floor and beaten, and a warning came over the radio that one more incident—and the plane would turn back.
“The Russians often recruited people from psychiatric hospitals and listed them as civilians for exchange.
This young man was one of them,” says Bizon.
It feels like it was all a dream
Even after a successful exchange, the aftermath of his captivity lingers: for five days, Bizon couldn’t sleep a wink.
“My greatest fear manifested in my dreams, when I constantly felt that my release was just a dream. I’d wake up in a cold sweat, with the acute feeling that I was back in that cell in Biysk with that idiot,” he shares.
Bizon returned from captivity weighing just 42 kilograms. This was after being exhausted at Azovstal, where constant hunger compounded his severe injuries. However, on the very second day after his release, he bought himself a shawarma. And almost immediately, he called his sister Ptashka to ask her to come cut his hair.
“My teeth were knocked out, I was shaggy and unkempt—I wanted to look like a human being again. And I also asked her to bring me a piece of steak!” Bizon recounts.
Ptashka insists that after such a long period of starvation, he shouldn’t eat such heavy food yet, but she grants his request. And Bizon savors the meat he’d been dreaming of.
A bullet from Mariupol that traveled all the way through his captivity
A few days later, he’s already lying on the operating table at the Heart Institute. Not because of the steak, of course.
“I only found out that this bullet had made its way to my heart after I was released from captivity,” he says.
The bullet lodged in the myocardium—precisely in the areas where the tissue was scarred by adhesions from previous surgeries. The muscle, scarred by the operations, stopped the bleeding.
“A congenital heart defect saved my life!” Bizon laughs.
Dreams Come
True With the funds he receives from Commander Yana Zinkevych and the government, he erects a monument on his mother’s grave. That dream turned out to be prophetic.
And he’s buying a house in the village.
“The lot is 14 sotok! There’s access to the river from the garden. And I’ve already picked out a spot to dig a little lake!”—he laughs.
Bizon plans to tear down the old house to build a new one in its place. But he’ll leave the plot’s greatest treasure untouched. There are two basements under the building, one of which is an old Austrian one, built from foundation bricks using a unique technique. Thanks to a special firing process that includes egg yolks, this brick has become virtually indestructible: it’s three times harder to drill through than modern concrete.
“Even a direct hit wouldn’t harm it! I’ll pour a new foundation on top—and that’s it,” the man shares his plans.
Returning to the Hospitaliers’ mission is like returning to oneself
With Yana Zinkevych
, commander of the “Hospitaliers”
Bizon continues his journey in the ranks of his home battalion, but now in a new, no less important role—he works in the “Hospitaliers” support service. He oversees matters related to the treatment, rehabilitation, and social protection of the fighters.
“To say, ‘I’ve done enough; let someone else take over now’—that’s not my style. Man, look ahead—there’s no end to the work!”
Serhiy Kovalov ensures that the wounded receive proper care and that the families of fallen comrades are supported. His current work is a logical continuation of the volunteer path he chose at the start of the war in 2014. Or perhaps even in the early 1990s, when he read his neighbor’s copy of Shevchenko’s *Kobzar* and fell in love with Ukraine and its complex yet life-affirming history.
Author: Myroslava Malyk
This is the story of medic Serhiy Kovalyov, call sign “Bison,” who endured the hell of Mariupol, three and a half years of Russian captivity, and returned to a life of freedom weighing just 42 kilograms.
This is the story of a man who was supposed to die as a child from a heart defect but survived shelling and torture with a Russian bullet lodged in his own myocardium.
Following his heart’s calling, Serhiy Kovalyov continues to help people through the battalion’s support service, because he understands better than anyone that while a person may face great trials in war, one must always choose life.
The Choice to Be Ukrainian
Lviv, 1988. Two boys share the space on a stair landing. Serhiyko is a frail child. Because of a heart defect, he doesn’t go to school; teachers come to him instead. Next to him is his neighbor, Nazarchik.
Serhiyko, the son of a Soviet air defense officer, diligently draws tanks with red stars. Nazar, on the other hand, draws insurgents and tridents—he has known history since childhood from his grandmother, a UPA liaison. A friendship blossoms between the neighbors. A few years later, Nazar lets his friend read *Kobzar*—the seed falls on fertile ground.
Thirty-seven years later, Nazar walks into a ward at a Kyiv hospital. There, he finds that very same childhood friend. They still live in the same apartment building. It’s just that Nazar hadn’t seen his neighbor for three and a half years.
41-year-old Serhiy Kovalyov spent those years in Russian captivity. His captors try to strip him of his Ukrainian identity.
Serhiy not only endures the full brunt of Dostoevsky’s suffering on his own body while in captivity, but also the moral oppression stemming from his identity. His tormentors have failed to shake his belief that people are fighting for his release.
August 24, 2025. The base of the “Hospitaliers” medical battalion. Volunteers and the families of the fallen have gathered to celebrate Independence Day. A ceremony is underway to honor those who save the lives of soldiers on the front lines. Battalion Commander Yana Zinkevich receives a phone call. Serhiy Kovalov, “Bizon,” speaks into the receiver. He has returned.
The struggle is worth every effort!
One can be born for war at any age
The 1990s. Serhiyko grows up, soaking up knowledge about the world, people, Soviet idols, and what those idols are capable of. He learns about the prison on Lontskogo Street and the fates of the people who were left to rot there. This story unfolded right here, just a few blocks from his native Sykhiv. He remembers the day—August 24—when the whole building roared and chanted: Ukraine has gained independence!
Life hasn’t been kind to the young man. A severe heart defect could trigger clinical death at any moment. Serhii undergoes three complex surgeries. During one of them, a mistake by the anesthesiologist leaves him in a coma for two weeks.
Due to his health condition, the young man is unfit for military service.
Serhiy earns a law degree, but he quickly grows bored with his profession. He switches to the construction industry—installing structured cabling networks. He quickly becomes the head of his own company. Business is going well, but a major crisis is brewing in the country.
November 30, 2013. “Berkut” security forces beat students with batons and their feet as they gathered on Independence Square to protest the Yanukovych regime. That night became a turning point: Maidan turned into the Revolution of Dignity.
This event also marked a “before” and “after” in the life of Serhiy, a resident of Lviv.
While running his business, he became an active patriot: he went on combat missions with volunteer battalions, engaged in patriotic education of youth through the “Trukhanivska Sich” organization, and cared for the families of the Heroes of the Heavenly Hundred. He participated in hearings regarding Maidan-related cases. Eventually, he devoted himself entirely to volunteer work, closing his construction firm.
In 2018, Serhiy Kovalyov met Yana Zinkevych and joined the “Hospitaliers” battalion. After completing a rotation, Bizon is now undergoing training. He travels to the Mariupol sector for all his rotations. He is stationed at the “Muraha” position, located between Shyrokyne and Vodyane. At this time, Vodyane is considered the hottest spot along the entire line of contact.
Bizon likes to stay on rotation for long periods, spending months on the front lines. He cleared a unique path through the minefields to rescue the wounded and carefully protects this route from the wheels of Ukrainian Armed Forces vehicles, reserving it solely for evacuations across the local rough terrain.
A paramedic knows no fatigue when faced with another’s pain
Summer 2021, Vodyane. In the gray zone, beyond the line of trenches—a wounded Azov soldier. The enemy mowed him down with machine gun fire: his buttocks shattered, his leg wounded, his cheek pierced. Bizon struggles to pull the soldier out, but doesn’t succeed right away—55 kilograms versus over 100.
The young man is unable to move and, lying on his back, begins to choke on his own blood.
“I’m dragging him on my back and praying, crying, laughing, throwing up—and I keep dragging him, crawling on all fours. It’s a good thing the grass is tall,” says Bizon.
When enemy artillery starts shelling them, the entire defensive line takes cover. Over the radio—a rumble, curses, and an order from the platoon ensign of the 128th: “Fire shells at ‘Sapoga’! Bizon is pulling our guys out from under fire there!”
Serhiy is moved: “I’m a civilian. I’m not one of them. But it moved me so deeply to see how much these guys care about my life!”
He regularly risks his life in dangerous situations. He feels he must be with the fighters to give the defenders a chance to survive after being wounded.
The eyes of the women with infants from the Drama Theater will remain in his heart forever
Winter 2021. Bizon spends New Year’s Eve at his post. On Christmas, he manages to slip away home—to his mother and son. But by February 7, he returns to the front lines.
A major war is looming.
Events unfold rapidly: On February 10, massive artillery barrages begin, and on February 25, air strikes are added to the assault. By February 27, they were retreating toward Mariupol, having first established a foothold in Volontyrivka. The village is situated on a hill, which turned out to be an ideal position for mortar fire.
“Our team, aside from providing medical care, has been actively participating in the fighting from the very first days, and soon we received a direct order to move into the territory of the 503rd Battalion with a mortar,” Serhiy says.
The Marines set up a triage station in the maternity hospital in Volontyrivka. Women are evacuated from there, while wounded soldiers are brought in. Once stabilized, they are transported to the Mariupol hospital. In one of the maternity hospital’s rooms, Bizon finds a stockpile of baby boxes.
“I used to deliver groceries to the Drama Theater and saw that women with children lacked everything: diapers, baby food. I loaded up everything I could find—I filled the whole car with baby boxes,” recalls Bizon.
The women are thrilled—the boxes contain everything the babies need.
Bizon delivers aid to the new mothers the day before Russia’s airstrike on the theater, which claimed the lives of hundreds of people.
The faces of those who ended up in a mass grave beneath the concrete slabs will stay with Bizon forever.
“We have to get out before dawn, or we’ll be hit by a massive airstrike.”
The road from Vodyanoye to Mariupol is becoming a real ordeal. Enemy artillery is mercilessly shelling the village, and at the only exit—an intersection that cannot be bypassed—the occupiers dropped a half-metric-ton aerial bomb. The crater is as deep as a five-story building.
They set out at night, without a single headlight in sight. Serhiy is behind the wheel of a “Mitsubishi L200,” which has only its rear axle working. Inside the cab, besides him, is a crew of medics: “Borisivna,” “Ptashka,” and “Drim,” and the cargo bed is packed to the brim with medical supplies.
Attached to a tow rope, the “Bizon” is pulling a “UAZ” that won’t start—the battery is dead. Inside that “UAZ” are four Marine mortarmen with two mortars and a full ammunition load.
There is no road to speak of—under the wheels lies a solid mass of rocks and debris from destroyed buildings. The overloaded trailer scrapes the ground with its undercarriage, catching on every pothole. To make out at least something in the pitch-black darkness, Bizon briefly turns on his flashlight, shielding the light with his hand so the enemy won’t spot it.
It takes four hours to cover these two kilometers.
“I knew we had to get out before dawn, or else we’d be hit by a massive airstrike,” the soldier says.
He drove off.
“The blast wave threw us right onto the wounded”
While on duty at the radio station, Bizon hears a desperate cry for help. Stepping out of the bunker, he sees a 20-year-old driver—the only member of the anti-aircraft gun crew who remained unharmed. Their anti-aircraft gun had just been hit by an enemy anti-tank guided missile. The consequences were catastrophic: the commander lost both legs and an arm, the gunner lost an arm, and the mechanic lost an arm and a leg.
They have to rescue the wounded under critical conditions. Three hundred meters away, a truck is on fire, and its ammunition—cartridges, grenades, and shells—is detonating nonstop. Borisovna, on her knees, tries to help the wounded man. Bizon struggles to place another soldier on a stretcher. At that very moment, an enemy tank opens fire with direct fire. Red-hot coals, pieces of metal, and burning slag fly all around.
“The blast wave threw us right onto the wounded. But it felt as if someone had covered us with an armored glass dome: everything within a meter’s radius was burning and exploding, yet we didn’t have a single scratch or a single piece of shrapnel,” says Bizon.
Firing at the enemy with a bullet in his chest
They plan their trip to the Illich Plant by marking their vehicles with white “Z”s. The crew heads to the assembly point, where Ptashka is already at the stabilization post.
On the way, the Russians open fire on the car. A burst of gunfire hits the right side, completely destroying the engine compartment. One of the bullets pierces the car’s armor and strikes Bizon in the chest.
“The metal tip passed between the armor plate and his body, entered his right sternum, and pierced his lung,” Serhiy states.
At this critical moment, Borisivna opens fire from the vehicle in return.
Despite his serious injury, Bizon tumbles out of the driver’s door and continues fighting.
A few minutes later, a “motorized unit” arrives. He is evacuated from under fire. Medics from the 36th Brigade and mortar crew members, having applied a pressure bandage, transport him to the bunker. There, they administer a Tranex injection to stop the internal bleeding.
His lung cavity is already filled with blood. Since they don’t have the right needle for drainage, they insert the largest catheter available—and it works.
“That bullet saved my life and the lives of my entire crew.”
On April 12, the Marine Corps commander orders a breakthrough toward Zaporizhzhia. But anyone who wants to can stay in Mariupol and head for “Azovstal.”
The first attempt to break through toward Zaporizhzhia on the night of April 12–13 fails. The occupiers destroyed the first column to set out with “Grad” rocket fire.
About 80% of the brigade—tanks, “Kozaks,” and heavy equipment—set out on that fateful advance. But Bizon doesn’t have his own “wheels”—his “Elka” broke down.
The marines gave the medics an armored “Oschadbank” cash-in-transit vehicle—a Ford Transit—in which Bizon cut a hole with an angle grinder so they could load the stretchers.
He rides in this modified vehicle until he is wounded.
“If I had gone on that breakthrough mission, both I and the entire crew would have been killed. But that bullet saved my life. And not just mine,” says Serhiy.
“I’d already pulled the pin to set off a grenade on myself… but a saving fog rolled in”
The risk of driving to Azovstal is enormous, but they can’t stay at the Illich Steel Plant any longer. All the wounded are loaded onto the vehicles, but the drivers don’t know where to go—they need an escort. Finally, they set off, but not for long—the vehicle hits a massive crater left by an aerial bomb. They can’t continue on.
“The whole convoy is moving on; we’re staying at the Illich Plant,” says Bizon.
Dawn is breaking.
They try to contact the Marines, but the radios aren’t getting through. Fortunately, in a nearby hangar, they find an abandoned “Kozak” armored vehicle—with flat tires, but equipped with a powerful “Lybid” radio.
They manage to establish contact.
“There are vehicles in the hangar—take whichever one you want, attach white flags, and head for Zaporizhzhia.
Surrender or break through. No one from ‘Azovstal’ will come back for you,” Bizon quotes the message he received. He adds: “And that’s when I realized that, as a volunteer, this prospect didn’t sit well with me. I’d already pulled out a grenade; I was about to set it off on myself, and the girls were crowding around me just as much. I’d already pulled the pin.”
But the radio comes on. “Rom” and “Palych” set out after their comrades at their own risk. They gathered about 40 people—excluding the wounded—and loaded into the “Kozak.”
Since its hydraulics were broken and the 12-metric-ton vehicle itself had flat tires, the four of them take turns turning the steering wheel to navigate around the bombed-out pipes and potholes. The drive seemed to last an eternity.
“It was broad daylight, springtime, and the sun was shining. Then suddenly, fog rolled in. And without a single shot fired, we drove into the plant’s territory,” says Bizon.
“It’s been a month since my wife died.”
They enter Azovstal on April 15. They haven’t even had time to settle in when the first alarm sounds—the enemy has broken through. Several enemy APCs and “bechs” broke through into the plant’s grounds. They managed to drive the enemy back. However, the hell still began: the enemy realized there were too many places where they could set up ambushes. There were many wounded, a constant shortage of medical supplies, and a dire food situation.
Early May. Rom enters the bunker and offers to take them up to his vehicle.
Rom is a soldier in the 36th Marine Brigade. After losing his wife—who was killed when a FAB bomb pierced the bunker—he seems to be seeking death for himself as well. He goes everywhere where there’s little chance of returning. He pulls out the wounded, retrieves the bodies of the dead, and manages to defuse the enemy corpses. And he comes back.
Bison says, “It feels like his wife was embracing him with her wings, along with everyone else who was there.”
Rom never spends the night in the bunker; instead, he always sleeps in his car, which is parked under a crane in a bombed-out hangar. After an airstrike, the hangar’s ceiling collapsed, and a concrete slab fell. It was heading toward the car but broke in half right above it. A “shelter” formed from the split concrete slab, and he sleeps in that car—the vehicle has become stationary since the area is controlled by the enemy.
Rom, inside the car, pulls out a can of sardines and a 100-gram measuring cup of alcohol.
“It’s been a month today since my wife died. Let’s remember her,” he says.
They divide the sardines among the three of them.
After the memorial, Rom unexpectedly suggests going down into the bunker, a place he usually won’t be coaxed into. They walk through a bombed-out hangar to the next one, which is relatively intact; there, rows of metal crates filled with electronics stand in order. Bizon follows Rom, with Borisovna behind them.
Suddenly, Rom stops, turns around, and holds out his hand, commanding, “Bizon, stop!”
“I press my chest against his arm and watch the scene behind him. A rocket flies into the side of the hangar, knocking out a chunk of the wall; a piece of concrete about a meter and a half in diameter flies out from that wall and sweeps away all those metal boxes, crushing them right where we were supposed to pass in a second. That chunk of concrete would have crushed us to a pulp right there,” Serhiy recounts.
Rom freezes in the dust amid the fire, staring into space with glassy eyes. A moment later—still in shock from their narrow escape—Bizon and Borisovna are already following him down, making their way over sharp shards deeper into the bunker.
He brought out the most precious thing from Olenivka—his dream
“For some time, they’d already been preparing us mentally and psychologically for captivity,” Bizon believes.
May. Convoys of trucks carrying those who, on the command’s orders, had left “Azovstal” as “honorary prisoners” set off for occupied Olenivka.
There, they are met by the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN), the FSB, and special forces. They are well-equipped, wearing helmets and body armor and carrying batons.
There is a shortage of food and water, unsanitary conditions, and above all—a severe shortage of medicine. More than 750 captives are held for over a week in a barracks designed to hold 200 people. They are later sorted and transported to other prisons.
In the barracks, the main topics of conversation are food and cars. They try not to mention their families, so as not to reopen old emotional wounds. The men spend hours discussing their culinary skills, sharing recipes for their favorite treats, and dreaming about what they’ll cook first after their release. Their plans for the future include opening their own bakeries and pizzerias. Others plan to buy trucks to transport grain.
“Everyone in the barracks has turned into a die-hard farmer!” laughs Bizon.
These dreams of a peaceful life are a true source of moral salvation for the men. Serhiy also dreams of his future home in a remote rural area.
Mandarin Propaganda
A burned-out barracks after the terrorist attack at the Olenivka
penal colony
He is being transported from Olenivka to Horlivka on July 28—the eve of the tragic execution of the “Azov” fighters. In Horlivka, Bizon has to endure yet another merciless “initiation”—a corridor of beatings and humiliation. New arrivals were “welcomed” with fists, feet, batons, and stun guns.
On New Year’s Eve, the occupiers stage a show for the TV cameras: volunteers bring mandarins to film the “humane” treatment. The prisoners are each given one peeled mandarin. And the peels are used to make compote for three more days—such are the echoes of the holiday.
When everyone is evacuated from Horlivka in a single day, due to a strange allocation principle, Bizon ends up in a prison in Torez. There he spends half a year in captivity.
With Stus on his mind and a psychopath in the same cell
From Torez, a five-day train journey begins to the Altai Krai—to Biysk. After a brutal reception, he is placed in solitary confinement with a strict schedule of beatings: in the morning and in the evening. By this point, the Rostov special forces already know that Bizon is a volunteer—and this fuels their rage.
They are forced to sing the Russian national anthem several times a day—after waking up, before every meal, and before lights out. And they have to sing loudly. In addition, strict rules apply in the cell: one must sit, the other must walk; otherwise, they’ll be beaten.
“I hum old Ukrainian Cossack songs to myself in my head. And in the darkest moments, I quote Stus to myself: ‘How good it is that I do not fear death,’ ” Serhiy shares.
These lines sustain him throughout his captivity.
Every week, Bizon is taken to so-called “interviews”—he’s tortured with electric shocks using a “tapik” in a basin of water, and a plastic bag is placed over his head until he loses consciousness.
They bring him back to consciousness with batons—and the cycle begins anew. When the standard three to four hours of torture end after just two—that’s incredible luck.
The windows have double bars—on the outside and inside—and the first set of bars is a meter away from the window. Air enters only through a narrow slit. Every day at noon, they begin taking people away for torture. They beat the “Azov” fighters and volunteers. And through that narrow slit, the cell fills with the screams and moans of those who were taken away this time.
“Enduring your own torture is easier—adrenaline helps you pull yourself together. The real test for the psyche is the daily screams of your comrades; it’s impossible to build up immunity to that. It’s a sound that’s impossible to endure,” says Bizon.
But an even greater hell begins inside the cell. For four months, he spends time face-to-face with Vadym Kovalenko, call sign “Kraken”—a chronic alcoholic and traitor to Ukraine who’d sell his soul to the devil for a cigarette.
To use the toilet, which is located right inside the cell, you have to go through a whole ritual: press a button, contact the guard on duty, and get permission. Breaking this rule is a surefire way to get beaten. They monitor everything through the cameras, and every “unauthorized” action is punished.
Kraken uses this button every time, deliberately setting Bison up for a beating whenever he hears Ukrainian coming from his mouth.
When Kraken himself lunges with his fists, Bison fights back. Afterward, he himself walks around for two weeks with bruises and contusions from the guards’ “disciplinary measures,” though his cellmate doesn’t throw any more punches.
“This Kraken guy is a former soldier; everyone there knows about him. When I tell my fellow inmates that I was in the same cell with him, they just cross themselves. They say I should get a medal for bravery—just for putting up with him and not going crazy,” “Bison” shares.
Six months before his release, in March, “Bison” dreams of his mother. She says she won’t live to see him.
“Who is this important man?”
One day, the cell door opens, and Bizon is led out—but without the usual shoves and baton blows to his spine. The detention center is supposed to transfer prisoners for transport or exchange without bruises, so hope begins to creep into his heart. However, when his hands and face are taped shut and he’s put alone in a police van, he gets scared.
From the police van, they take him to the airport in Novosibirsk. They put him on a plane and send him on a charter flight to Chelyabinsk.
“They took me to the airport, where I spent the night in the police van because, as I overheard, they couldn’t find a sober pilot over the weekend,” Serhiy says.
Finally, in the morning, they find a pilot. And he flies to Moscow on a chartered Bizon plane. On the plane, the guards can’t figure out who this important man is, the only one being transported to the Russian capital.
It later turns out that the prisoner exchange was delayed because everyone was waiting for Sergei Kovalev to arrive.
“In Moscow, they transferred me to a UAZ, in which we drove for about ten minutes, after which they led me to the second floor of a transport plane. It was there, out of the corner of my eye from under the duct tape blindfold, that I saw our other soldiers—emaciated and battered by life,” Bizon recounts.
The tension eased only once we were on Belarusian territory, when the guards began to untie the prisoners’ eyes and hands. But at that moment, the exchange nearly fell through: a civilian man lunged at a guard with a sharp object, for which he was thrown to the floor and beaten, and a warning came over the radio that one more incident—and the plane would turn back.
“The Russians often recruited people from psychiatric hospitals and listed them as civilians for exchange.
This young man was one of them,” says Bizon.
It feels like it was all a dream
Even after a successful exchange, the aftermath of his captivity lingers: for five days, Bizon couldn’t sleep a wink.
“My greatest fear manifested in my dreams, when I constantly felt that my release was just a dream. I’d wake up in a cold sweat, with the acute feeling that I was back in that cell in Biysk with that idiot,” he shares.
Bizon returned from captivity weighing just 42 kilograms. This was after being exhausted at Azovstal, where constant hunger compounded his severe injuries. However, on the very second day after his release, he bought himself a shawarma. And almost immediately, he called his sister Ptashka to ask her to come cut his hair.
“My teeth were knocked out, I was shaggy and unkempt—I wanted to look like a human being again. And I also asked her to bring me a piece of steak!” Bizon recounts.
Ptashka insists that after such a long period of starvation, he shouldn’t eat such heavy food yet, but she grants his request. And Bizon savors the meat he’d been dreaming of.
A bullet from Mariupol that traveled all the way through his captivity
A few days later, he’s already lying on the operating table at the Heart Institute. Not because of the steak, of course.
“I only found out that this bullet had made its way to my heart after I was released from captivity,” he says.
The bullet lodged in the myocardium—precisely in the areas where the tissue was scarred by adhesions from previous surgeries. The muscle, scarred by the operations, stopped the bleeding.
“A congenital heart defect saved my life!” Bizon laughs.
Dreams Come
True With the funds he receives from Commander Yana Zinkevych and the government, he erects a monument on his mother’s grave. That dream turned out to be prophetic.
And he’s buying a house in the village.
“The lot is 14 sotok! There’s access to the river from the garden. And I’ve already picked out a spot to dig a little lake!”—he laughs.
Bizon plans to tear down the old house to build a new one in its place. But he’ll leave the plot’s greatest treasure untouched. There are two basements under the building, one of which is an old Austrian one, built from foundation bricks using a unique technique. Thanks to a special firing process that includes egg yolks, this brick has become virtually indestructible: it’s three times harder to drill through than modern concrete.
“Even a direct hit wouldn’t harm it! I’ll pour a new foundation on top—and that’s it,” the man shares his plans.
Returning to the Hospitaliers’ mission is like returning to oneself
With Yana Zinkevych
, commander of the “Hospitaliers”
Bizon continues his journey in the ranks of his home battalion, but now in a new, no less important role—he works in the “Hospitaliers” support service. He oversees matters related to the treatment, rehabilitation, and social protection of the fighters.
“To say, ‘I’ve done enough; let someone else take over now’—that’s not my style. Man, look ahead—there’s no end to the work!”
Serhiy Kovalov ensures that the wounded receive proper care and that the families of fallen comrades are supported. His current work is a logical continuation of the volunteer path he chose at the start of the war in 2014. Or perhaps even in the early 1990s, when he read his neighbor’s copy of Shevchenko’s *Kobzar* and fell in love with Ukraine and its complex yet life-affirming history.
This is an automatic translation generated by DeepL.