Passengers arrived at Kharkiv station for Friday's early morning train to Kyiv trailing suitcases, sleepy children, reluctant dogs and clouds of previously unimaginable fears.
The day before, according to United Nations estimates, some 100,000 Ukrainians had taken to the roads and rails to flee Russia's invasion of their country, as the Kremlin unleashed missile strikes on targets nationwide and sent tens of thousands of soldiers, tanks, fighter jets and attack helicopters across the border.
As a frosty dawn crept over Kharkiv, a university city of 1.4 million just 35km from the Russian frontier, many people were ending a surreal night spent deep in metro stations that provide shelter from any missile fire, while others made for the capital to reunite with family or use it as a staging post to western Ukraine or the safety of the European Union.
Many arrived at Kharkiv station – a grand communist-era building the colour of lemon curd that is still decorated with stylised scenes from Soviet history – already flustered by last-minute preparations, trouble getting across town now that most public transport and taxis have stopped working, and worried that the 500km trip to Kyiv might not happen at all.
"We'll be leaving on time," declares Jan Barmak, sitting at the controls of the engine alongside fellow driver Eduard Zorya.
“We did this route yesterday, from Kyiv, and it was alright. They say it was ‘hot’ last night around Kyiv and a jet fighter was shot down near Darnytsia,” he adds, referring to an eastern suburb of Kyiv that is the last stop on the route before the capital’s central station.
“But don’t worry, we’ll get there.”
Half-full
The two men have been driving trains for decades, and Zorya used to work the Donetsk-Kyiv route before the eastern city was seized by Moscow-led militants in 2014 and became the stronghold of one of two self-declared "people's republics" that Russia recognised as independent states in the run-up to its all-out invasion of Ukraine.
He hails from Slovyansk, a city between Donetsk and Kharkiv that was briefly under militia-control eight years ago before being retaken by government forces, and which is in an area that Russia now claims rightfully belongs to the breakaway region.
As Barmak promised the train pulled away on time, and despite being sold out according Ukraine’s national rail operator, its comfortable carriages were barely half-full.
"Lots of people who bought tickets have probably already left," explains chief conductor Maxim Onishchuk, leaning on the bar of the closed buffet beside a flag of Ukraine.
“Many went yesterday evening on overnight trains to the west, and some probably went by car or decided in the end to sit tight. I think this train is carrying the last ones who want to leave,” he says.
“The journey from Kyiv to Kharkiv yesterday fine, nothing out of the ordinary, no incidents. But you can imagine the state that people are in with what’s happening in the country. They are scared, worried, uncertain. Even more so when they’re fleeing with kids.”
Last stop
As the train neared Darnytsia, an announcer said this would be its last stop and it would not continue to central Kyiv.
At the same time, passengers were receiving calls, messages and reading social media posts about Russian troops reportedly breaching Kyiv’s defences and entering the capital.
“We were going to stay with relatives in Kyiv to see what happens, hoping that somehow everything would calm down,” says Iryna, a teacher from Kharkiv.
“But now, we just don’t know. How will it be if the Russians take over, how will they treat people?” she wonders, while debating the wisdom of an urgent change of plans with her husband.
"He has family near Lviv [near Poland] so perhaps we'll try to go straight there. Some of our friends left for Poland yesterday. We don't want to leave Ukraine, but we just don't know what will happen – until a few days ago, who would have imagined Russian soldiers in Kyiv?"
