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Russia never signed the mine ban. Now Ukraine’s sappers live in the world that created.
Ukraine was a signatory to the Ottawa Treaty, banning anti-personnel mines. On 29 June 2025, it officially withdrew, citing Russia’s widespread use of banned mines like the PFM-1 across Ukrainian territory. But stepping away from the treaty won’t protect sappers from the mines already scattered by Russia. In Kherson, I spoke to a Ukrainian sapper who lost part of his foot after stepping on a Russian PFM-1 — one of thousands still buried in civilian areas.
I took a step forward to photograph the piano for her, then stopped, remembering that everything around was mined.
The Palace of Culture in Kherson looked like a torn Japanese divider—translucent sheets on a lattice frame, light filtering through squares.
On 25 September 2024, two Russian aerial-guided bombs had turned a beloved community center into a skeleton.
Photo: IRS Pivden
A grand piano loomed in the dusk. A few hours ago, my friend Alyona, in tears, showed me the video of this piano in flames—she used to play it as a little girl.
#Kherson A piano in flames in a city arts center after a Russian aerial bomb attack this morning.
— Zarina Zabrisky
A dancer I am interviewing now is heartbroken: she spent her childhood here. pic.twitter.com/7DYjFsVkCf(@ZarinaZabrisky) September 25, 2024
Like many Khersonians, Alyona survived nine months of Russian occupation, lost her house in the flood, but rarely showed emotion. Yet now, she wept.
The dark stage in the amphitheater once hosted dance recitals, chorus competitions, and rock concerts. Now, it was a minefield.
A blue-green ballet studio with broken bars and shattered mirrors was once filled with little ballerinas in pink tutus. Now, it was infested with banned anti-infantry mines with the deceptively beautiful name—”Petals.”
Walking through the remains of the Palace of Culture was not just soul-crushing and glass-crashing. It was deadly.
The Russian military remotely mined Kherson. To clear it, an EOD team had to clear the site.
I stepped outside and heard the drone buzzing. Russian killer drones swept back and forth, like angry wasps. They dropped grenades, homemade explosives, incendiary devices, and “Petals.”
I ducked under a tree to wait for the drone to fly toward the Dnipro River, back to the Russian pilot’s nest on the occupied bank.
— Zarina Zabrisky
#Kherson #DroneAttacks and aerial bombs.
Reporting from the bombed arts center—had a close call at the end, taking cover under a tree from a Russian drone.
At least 6 injured by #DroneAttacks today.
Right now, Kherson suburbs are attacked by aerial bombs. pic.twitter.com/68CiQEEYB2
In an hour, a message flashed on my phone: an EOD lost his foot demining the site. Volodymyr Perepylytsia, head of explosive services for the National Police in Kherson Oblast, spoke to me before, telling me PFM-1 anti-personnel mines, “look like fallen leaves. If you step on them, you lose a limb.”
He was now at the hospital, in need of a blood transfusion.
Ukraine exits global mine ban for self-defense reasons as Russia ignores international law
How do you measure impossible?
How hard is EOD in Kherson? On a scale of 0 to 100, Volodymyr gives it a thousand. Still, he and his team keep going.
A few months later, Volodymyr is back to demining, and I speak to him about that day.
Hunted by a Russian drone, he also had to hide under the tree. He knew that it could be mined, and, of two evils, he chose the lesser one.
Trained to provide first aid, he applied the tourniquet to himself while he waited for the team to rescue him.
Russian drones continued to patrol the sky over the Palace of Culture, aiming for the “double tap” to attack the first responders.
“I was thinking about my wife, my son, my loved ones. It helped,” said Volodymyr.
“And now? I lost my foot, but I can still do my job. I don’t see my life outside of service, outside of defending my country. I volunteered to serve in the Armed Forces of Ukraine in 2014, when the war began. As long as I can walk, breathe, and talk, I will be in the defense forces.”
Since September 2024, the situation has deteriorated. Russian forces are not just laying mines remotely—they are turning mine clearance into a trap.
Once sappers arrive to demine, they are targeted by drones and artillery. Civilians passing through are also hit. EOD teams face the possibility of being struck mid-defusal, with unstable explosives literally in their hands.
Russian forces continue to evolve their tactics, said Volodymyr. Munitions and drones are now fitted with motion and seismic sensors, touch activation, and remote radio signals. No two devices are the same. Remote-controlled explosive devices (RCEDs) present a growing concern.
Drones deliver munitions embedded with radio-controlled detonators. These devices may fall or land, then explode, activated by a remote trigger.
Ukrainian EOD teams continue operating under direct fire and risking their lives to clear explosives in civilian areas, but the accident forced the sappers to rethink safety.
“What’s more important: demining or the EOD life? Should the operation proceed urgently, or can it wait?” said Volodymyr.
The decision to enter a location no longer depends solely on the presence of mines or explosive hazards—it hinges on real-time evaluation of Russian drone activity.
Before deployment, teams assess the drone threat level. If there are red flags, operations may be delayed or aborted.
When civilians report suspicious items in parks, yards, or homes, EOD’s responses are calculated. If a drone carrying a 5–6 kg payload is active in the area, demining may be postponed.
The immediate response could destroy nearby homes and kill civilians. Residents often understand the risk and agree to wait.
Along the Dnipro River, demining efforts mean near-certain death due to multiple threats, such as mines underfoot, the presence of aerial bombs, and strike drones above.
“It is an art,” Volodymyr says.
What kind of person volunteers to defuse bombs?
Another EOD won’t give his call names for the interview: the EODs are on the Russian military top priority hit list. Athletic, tall, face calm, my interlocutor goes by “Sapper.”
“It’s like a game, full of surprises, thrills, and traps,” he says. “I love it. The challenges. The rush of adrenaline.”
His eyes are glittering with excitement, and he sounds like a theater director staging an avant-garde play. He echoes Volodymyr’s point,
“A lot of it is art. The art of improvisation. And a lot of it is psychology: To be successful, an EOD expert must think like the adversary. What could be mined? What is it?”
“Our task is to disarm bombs—and not blow up in the process,” a Kherson sapper told me in an interview. “Watch The Hurt Locker to understand about sappers.”
The Hollywood film showed an EOD operator in full gear with a squad backing him up. In Ukraine and in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, sapper work might look less sci-fi—but the same level of nerve, precision, and trust is a must.
The Sapper lights a cigarette and shows me the lighter, then points at my power bank and my cell phone.
“Could be any of this. Or—is it your laptop? A discarded Sprite can?” he says.
“Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) could be hidden in rubble and then detonated as booby-traps or remotely, by phone. Good EODs recognize each other by their signature style. We can identify the distinctive traits of the explosives maker. Like serial killers, each ordnance maker has his own signature style, rituals, and habits. You read wires’ length and attachments.”
The Kherson EOD team, for instance, knows there are four instructors training Russians on the other side of the river. Their students adopt their signature style, with slight modifications.
–How do you learn to be an EOD?
–I started as a teenager. Basic knowledge, a good teacher, and plenty of experience are essential. Many learn from the Internet, but you have to be careful as it is a minefield of its own, full of traps, with many misleading YouTube manuals for making explosives.
–How does your typical day go?
–A phone call from the residents. A drone attack. I need to drive to the location, but it is not straightforward. Often, another Russian drone follows me or waits for me there. I carry a Kalashnikov to shoot it down. A hunter rifle would be better, as it fires with a spread of pebbles, but it’s $300. I can’t afford that. Both AK and hunter rifle shoot only as far as 75 meters. Drones fly at 120 meters above the ground. If it flies lower—around 30 meters—it is a kamikaze drone. Means an imminent attack.
With drone attacks intensifying, EOD experts in Kherson must possess extraordinary combat stress resistance. Since spring 2024, Russian drones have targeted the coastal areas and suburbs of Kherson, and by May 2025, they’ve reached the city’s central and previously considered “safe” districts.
Mavic drones can cover distances of up to 15 km, carrying up to 600 grams, while FPV drones can travel up to 19 km, depending on their load, with the capacity to carry up to 4 kg of explosives.
Both types often carry retransmitter devices, which extend their range or help bypass obstacles like terrain or interference. The larger the battery, the further the drone can fly, but it sacrifices explosive payload.
Once the Sapper manages to arrive at the site, he needs to determine whether the suspect device—an FPV drone or explosives—had detonated. He needs to think critically and confront the issue before it becomes uncontrollable. The Russians disguise ordnance as home appliances and trash.
If the device did not detonate, the Sapper’s task is to neutralize the ordnance. If it did, he often has to sift through the rubble and body parts to establish what kind of drone and ordnance were used.
“You must have high combat stress resistance,” says the Sapper. “Seeing dozens of killed children is not good for your mental health.”
This deadly expertise comes at a price. Chris “Swampy” Garrett, a British Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) expert, was killed on 6 May 2025 during a demining mission near Izium.
In Ukraine since 2014, Swampy joined the Azov Regiment as an instructor and co-founded Prevail Together, a nonprofit focused on mine clearance, medical aid, and risk education. His death underscores the daily risks faced by Ukraine’s sappers—technicians tasked with disarming mines and unexploded ordnance.
“They put grenades in washing machines.” Hero Brit killed while saving Ukrainian families from Russian “surprises” left behind infant daughter
How the game keeps changing
Mavic drones are primarily used for reconnaissance but occasionally drop fragmentation grenades (VOGs), which cause shrapnel injuries, mostly to limbs, but rarely fatal.
FPV drones, however, are used as kamikaze drones or to drop explosives, including both industrially manufactured munitions and improvised incendiary devices (IIDs), often resembling “collars on dogs.”
In addition to standard munitions, the Russian military deploys incendiary devices, such as napalm mixtures produced during the Soviet era. IIDs with such mixtures explode on impact, igniting fires.
Soviet-made K51 chemical grenades with toxic substances have been dropped in Antonivka, causing respiratory burns. The most lethal of these are the fragmentation munitions.
There are also innovative devices, like magnetic target sensors that detonate when metal comes close. If civilians attempt to dispose of ordnance with a spade, these devices can trigger an explosion. Such munitions can be disguised as household items or waste, like a can of Sprite found in Antonivka.
Additionally, grenades from underbarrel grenade launchers are sometimes converted into mini aerial bombs. Each new improvised explosive device presents a unique puzzle—and an ever-deadlier risk. With AI now being incorporated, the challenges for EOD experts in Ukraine continue to evolve.
Hi, I’m Zarina, a frontline reporter for Euromaidan Press and the author of this piece. We aim to shed light on some of the world’s most important yet underreported stories. Help us make more articles like this by becoming a Euromaidan Press patron.
The threat now also includes sabotage and suicide-style attacks. A new tactic has emerged, with Russian special forces recruiting or coercing Ukrainian civilians into becoming saboteurs. Explosives are hidden in bags or parcels and left in public areas. In some cases, individuals detonate themselves, knowingly or unknowingly.
Ukraine’s withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention puts it in company with Finland, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—all countries that have either withdrawn or announced their intention to do so since Russia’s invasion began.
These nations, facing direct threats from a neighbor unconstrained by humanitarian law, have chosen military necessity over international idealism.
Still, the sappers keep going. They rely on shared knowledge, sharp instincts, and their love of the work. As Volodymyr puts it, knowing the scale of danger he faces every day: “My motivation is victory in the war against the invader.”
