We publish her direct speech, where she tells how everything really happened.
“My name is Marianna Vyshemirskaya, before the war I used live in Donetsk, in Makiivka to be correct, then I met my husband and we decided to live together, to get married. So, in fact, I ended up in Mariupol at 2020, just before the quarantine, when the borders were closed for quarantine.
Well, in general, most of people here thought that the situation was not particularly terrible… that it might happen something, but we will survive all this. But in the end, when the scale of what was happening began to grow, then of course people began to panic, it was already impossible to leave the city, they did not let them out.
A friend of my husband, his wife tried to leave, and she exploded on a mine near Zaporozhye. On March 2, they turned off the water, turned off the electricity, completely cut off the power, there was still gas, a couple of days, I don’t know for sure, and then the gas was cut off, well, there was absolutely nothing.
On March, 6 we have already decided that we need to go to the hospital, because I was already.. well, just about, and I was expectant, and we came to the hospital, and they accepted us, they didn’t refuse us. We came to the Maternity Hospital No.3, because there was nowhere else to go: the No.2 was not accepting parturient women, and the No.1 Maternity Hospital, they had the most modern equipment, first we came there, the staff said that no one seemed to be keeping women in labor there and everyone can go home, and then a little later they came and said that it wasn’t just that they weren’t keeping women in the hospital — women have to be evicted from there. But they reasoned it by the fact that the military will come to hospital and they need to settle here, because there are solar panels here.
They moved the women in labor to another, the only one left … to the only remaining Maternity Hospital, they only had a small electric generator that worked exclusively on ventilators for children. The guys, the husbands of pregnant women, they lived in the basement of the building. And on the street there was a field kitchen, which was mounted by the same guys, people from the nearby houses were bringing them foodstuffs so that they would cook us some food.
They had a teakettle there, there was a metal barrel in which they heated boiling water there and other food. The military did nothing to help us. The military came one day and said: “Give us food”, so, they are told: “What kind of food? It’s all for pregnant women”. They say, “We haven’t eaten anything for five days”, so they took our food, they say, “You’ll cook some more”.
When the explosion happened, everything was peaceably, it was March 9th, there were no shots, we slept peacefully at night. And then, on March 9th, we were sitting and discussing the “pokunok malyuka” (baby’s package) – what’s inside, and we heard the shell thundered, then I personally threw a blanket over myself instinctively, and then we heard the second shell.
Shards of glass partially hit me and slightly cut my nose, under my lip and above, but it was insignificant, I mean it was more cut at the top and it [the blood] flowed on my eyes, on my cheek.
Already the second explosion thundered, we left, we were evacuated to the basement. Then we began to discuss whether there was an air raid, they said that there was no air raid, that is, our opinion was confirmed that we did not hear, they did not hear either, they said that it was a shell.
There were no more explosions after these two explosions sounded. We sat there for literally 5-10 minutes, there was no continuation. The military came and said they were ready to evacuate us. I was the last to leave, because they told me: “Your wounds don’t need to be sewn up, you will now bleed a little, shallowly, and then the bleeding will stop.”
I stood for 15 minutes and examined the area around, well, as it were, with one eye, examined it as it is said, and looked at the windows. Then I turn around and saw that there was a military man in a helmet, I examined him, he had something fluffy in his hands, I realized that he was filming. I asked him not to take pictures of me, because I didn’t have time for this now, I don’t want to be in the public eye, well, why do I need it? It’s not the time for this. He said to me: “Good,” and walked away.
And when we went out on the first floor there was again a reporter, the same one, and he started filming me. At this time the guys told him not to film, he ignored them. They told him again, and he kind of left.
My husband kind of took a better look at them because they came the next day. He said it was Associated Press. They spoke Russian, they had helmets, they had something written [on chest], but frankly I didn’t even read it, but my husband did, because he was with me on the second day.
They appeared immediately, because those photos that I saw when I was in a quiet situation and I was understanding what was happening at all… They said that it was me lying on the couch with a blanket in other clothes. It wasn’t me, it was the girl who died. She was carried out first because she was in the most serious condition, she and the child were not saved. It’s just that she… she was taken to the hospital, but neither she nor the child survived. Her husband visited us after, he just cried standing on his knees. The man had no family left, nothing at all. And it was this girl, it wasn’t me, they didn’t change my clothes, they didn’t make me up. And they were there from the beginning I believe, right away, because, well, we had 2-3 minutes to go down to the basement, also let’s say we sat there for 10 minutes, that is, it’s 12 minutes, and she was already carried out first on a stretcher, she was put on a stretcher, and she was already photographed there, it turns out, at that time. So they were already there, I guess.
We were taken to the 17th microdistrict to the hospital. They came after I was caesarean, the very next day they came, and I saw them, I told my husband: “These are the ones who photographed me,” because they were the same guys. They asked me: “Tell us – when? What? How?”. I answered: “Like this and like that”. “Was there an air raid or was it not?” they asked, I said: “There was no air raid, no one heard it at all, even those who were on the street.”
When, I say, I literally just now got into favorable conditions and I got online and first of all started to look for all these interviews, and I found a bunch of everything, but I could not find this interview. Was it or was it not, although for some reason I’ve found the rest of interviews but I did not find this one.”
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