A Co Meath-based group has just returned from Ukraine where they delivered their 107th vehicle to the war-torn country for humanitarian use.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine the group has delivered four-wheel drive vehicles, ambulances, buses and vans, most of them filled with medical supplies.
The vehicles are used by the army mainly in ferrying injured soldiers and civilians to hospital from either the front line or from Russian drone attacks.
The latest convoy of vehicles left Trim on May 3rd with 16 vehicles and 31 drivers taking turns to drive through France, the Netherlands, Poland and on to Lviv in western Ukraine.
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Volunteer driver David Duignan of Dunderry, who has been on a number of such trips said the experience was emotional, having visited a cemetery in Lviv where more than 1,000 new graves of Ukrainian soldiers, added since the war broke out, are accompanied by images of the young men who died.
“Lviv is a very strange place now with almost no men, just women and young women tending the graves,” he said.
Mr Duignan, a heating engineer from Dunderry, said they have been given tremendous support including ambulances from the Beacon Hospital, Dublin, and vehicles from Dublin Fire Brigade – which also sent a number of its officers on the drive to Ukraine. He said another member of the group, Fergal Bent, has an electrical business, Electrogen, and through him more than 35 emergency generators have been supplied.
The project was initiated in 2022 shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Mick Hughes, who is one of the team behind the StockHouse Restaurant in Trim, happened to be in Berlin when he saw the trainloads of evacuees arriving in the city’s main train station with families, particularly women and children fleeing the war.
Mr Hughes said as he had a little German he offered to help. The image of the little girl in the red coat from the film Schindler’s List was uppermost in his mind “Only there were hundreds of little ones here,” he said.
However, he was told his help could not be accepted by the authorities processing the immigrants, as he had not been vetted. It was explained to him that while there were many good people in the crowds who wanted to help, there were also people who were sex traffickers and slave traffickers seeking to prey on the immigrants. As the full horror of the remarks sunk in, he was told: “Wait until it comes to your country and see what you can do then.”
Back in Trim he spoke to his partner Orla and their business partners Carmel and Tom Darcy and the project to deliver practical aid to Ukraine was born. Visitors to the StockHouse are now able to track the progress in words and pictures as well as in a self-published book put together by Mr Hughes.
“We passed on the 107th vehicle on this trip,” said Mr Duignan. “It is growing all the time. We now have people coming from Co Clare and Co Cavan and elsewhere.” He added that anybody interested in helping could make contact with the group through the StockHouse Restaurant in Trim.
The group is planning another trip to Ukraine in the autumn.
