OSB boards outlined a house that looks quite ordinary. But the pile of construction debris nearby indicates it is the result of a brutal war. A familiar scene for those who walk the streets of Chornobaivka every day. As it turned out, these forms hide a history of pain.
“You can go inside, everything here was collapsed. That wall stood there, there was a wall here. That’s the neighbors’ room now. Yes, and that wall was blown out. Our furniture was all the way over there,” says the man, standing in the middle of a single space separated from the street by the same OSB boards, which are now almost the only “structure” forming the house. The homeowner is a coach who has been working with athletes with disabilities for twenty years. This is Ruslan Malashenko – the director of the Kherson Children’s and Youth Sports School for Children with Disabilities.
“Oh, look what she did to us. Hm. And this beam, won’t it fall?” Ruslan’s wife suddenly comes in from the street and looks up. Indeed, above us hangs a beam that once formed the roof. “It seems to be holding,” Ruslan says briefly and adds that besides the walls of the building that once served as a home for two families (a house for two neighbors), the roof was also severely damaged. Local church volunteers helped cover the structure and protect the remains from wind and precipitation. Some building materials were provided by the Chornobaivka SVA.
On December 20, 2024 this yard became the center of a massive shelling. On the day Kherson residents called “Armageddon” – in one hour the Russian army fired more than 1,000 shells at Kherson.
“That was already the third hit,” the homeowner recalls. While the family was at training camps in Cherkasy, the house was destroyed. At 5 a.m. on December 20 neighbors called and told them about it. Judging by the destruction, it’s clear that if the couple had been at home, they probably would not have survived.
“They pulled out 300 kg slabs of walls with tractors, they were that heavy,” says Ruslan and briefly recounts the morning call, how they quickly “flew” from Cherkasy to Chornobaivka and by evening began to clear the rubble.
We met for a conversation in January 2025. The yard has already been cleared, but small construction and repair works are still ongoing. Ruslan and an assistant are trying to put in order everything that the Russian shells brought with them.
Going out into the yard, he tells the story of all the hits. The first occurred back during the occupation. This may surprise outsiders, but not the Chornobaivka residents. While Ukraine was counting strikes on the airport, the Russians returned their systems to the village and shelled civilians, trying to take revenge on them.
Thus, in the summer of 2022 a cluster munition landed in Ruslan Malashenko’s yard. Shrapnel scattered across the yard and left distinctive scars on the metal garage gates. That time the house was damaged for the first time as well – five windows were blown out.
The house was hit again in the summer of 2024, when on July 30 the Russian army carried out a massive shelling of Chornobaivka.
“There were 2 shells there, 2 there and 2 there. 6 out of 40 shells hit us here,” Ruslan points at neighboring buildings, remembering that day and how once again they had to replace the windows.
This time, when hit for the third time, the house did not survive. It is uninhabitable, as is the summer kitchen nearby. Ruslan Malashenko and his wife live with neighbors, coming home every day and trying to preserve what remains of it.
The war has changed the lives of all locals, but this family does everything to preserve their way of life. Sport plays a huge role in it. It is a life’s work that benefits the whole Kherson region. So, amid a yard with scraps of metal, walls, boards and the sounds of construction tools and distant explosions, we talk about the region’s sporting life — how it was, how it is and how they would like it to be.
“We are still training Paralympians, children with disabilities, conducting sports rehabilitation, preparing for competitions,” says Ruslan Malashenko and explains that the Kherson DYuSSh for people with disabilities prepares athletes for the Paralympic and Deaflympic Games (athletes with hearing impairments), World Championships, European Championships.
This work continues now, but with those they managed to keep. If before the invasion together with the Kherson Regional Center “Invasport” (“Invasport – the system of physical culture and sports for people with disabilities that functions in Ukraine at the state level, – MOST) about 400–450 people with disabilities regularly did sports, now only a few remain in Kherson. Across the country roughly 50–60 people are training.
Most athletes left, taking coaches with them. Some are in Kyiv, some in Odesa, Ternopil. Of course, they had to leave the region during the occupation.
Until May 2022 Ruslan Malashenko himself was in Chornobaivka. During the entire occupation he tried to support athletes and people with disabilities. With the help of various charitable foundations he organized the evacuation of athletes and coaches from the occupied territory. One athlete, Yuliya Kyselova, was taken out of Nova Kakhovka by Ruslan’s wife. Later Yuliya took part in the 2023 Deaflympics.
“Of course, no one then took direct responsibility for the evacuation. No one could guarantee whether you would pass the Russian checkpoints or not. Each person took responsibility upon themselves. Because even when I left via Davydiv Brid, the occupiers let us through, but when we reached Ukrainian positions – the shelling began. The Russians understood that approximate time and began to shell civilian convoys deliberately. And this is not an isolated case,” Ruslan recalls.
Was there betrayal and choosing the side of the aggressor within Kherson’s sporting life? Yes, and this weighs heavily on Ruslan’s heart. He is outraged that several athletes who competed for the Ukrainian national team are now trying to become part of the Russian team.
He also cannot understand the actions of the heads of sports schools who cooperated (out of 9 regional sports schools 4 went into cooperation). Some kept quiet and until the last said: “What are you talking about, no, I’m not working.” And then, in occupation Telegram channels, news appeared about how that coach organized in Skadovsk the “Kherson Region RF Shooting Federation”.
“I called him, I said, why did you lie, why didn’t you tell the truth. He quietly submitted a resignation, we fired him and that was it. The head of the sports department also became a collaborator (Vitalii Vybranskyi, – MOST). We reached out to him at the beginning: what are our actions, what to do. ‘Sit quietly’ – and that was it,” Ruslan Malashenko recalls about those times of Kherson’s occupation. They were full of chaos and misunderstandings.
He also received calls asking, “How can we talk to you?”. But the call from the occupation went to Lviv region, where Ruslan Malashenko had gone with his family. So the reply to the collaborator was decisive: “There is no way to talk! Come here, we’ll talk if you really want to.”
It is also unpleasant that those coaches or heads of sports schools who sided with the enemy reported on athletes who still remained in the occupied region, essentially “handing” them over to the Russians.
“For half a year we were not paid salaries. But the athletes continued training. They prepared for achievements. In 2023 there were the Deaflympics, and the same Yulia Kyselova, whom my wife evacuated, competed for Kherson. Unfortunately, due to lack of funding she later competed for Donetsk region,” Ruslan Malashenko recalls.
Today the total number of athletes in the region has decreased fourfold. But the achievements of representatives in this field proved that sport in Kherson region is alive and needs support. Therefore, the Kherson OVA supported funding for the sector.
Of course, Kherson region cannot compete with other regions. It’s simply impossible. Before the full-scale invasion in the group of cities/regions with populations over a million, the Kherson region held 3rd place for five years. We were ahead of by Mykolaiv and Poltava.
Now the Kherson DYuSSh for children with disabilities has 80 athletes. The vast majority of them are outside the region. It is simply physically impossible to train and develop in Kherson. Daily shelling has destroyed almost all sports infrastructure.
“If earlier for the ‘Believe in Yourself’ athletics meet for children with disabilities we would bring 45–50 children, last year it was 2–3 athletes. Yes, we managed to keep high-performance sport, those who train professionally. But where will we find the little kids? To hire a coach at 0.25 FTE, I need to enroll 9 children just in Kherson region. How is that possible?” Ruslan explains and describes how difficult it was to create a small rehabilitation group – a karate section. All the children live in different parts of the city and not all parents are willing to bring a child from one part of the city to another, not knowing when shelling might start.
Nevertheless, even in such difficult conditions they manage to plan and think about the future. And Ruslan Malashenko speaks about this very optimistically. He is negotiating with city and regional administrations to find a ground-floor or basement space of about 200 square meters. To equip it he plans to write a grant application and create a universal gym for children and adults with disabilities. He also plans to conduct sports rehabilitation for military personnel.
This facility is needed now, because as already mentioned Kherson’s sports infrastructure has suffered huge losses. Listing destroyed stadiums and sports halls against the backdrop of his ruined house, he appears as a person who understands the tragedy of the situation but at the same time has a clear vision of solutions that can be implemented.
Our conversation ended there; the sportsman went back to work, saving his home. But in his thoughts he is also saving sport in Kherson region.
The kind of sport that gives reasons for pride, even under these circumstances.
At the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris, three athletes represented Kherson region. Two of them are from the Kherson DYuSSh for children with disabilities. Sprinter Ivan Tetyukhin finished 5th in the 200-meter race and Ruslan Malashenko’s student, world champion and multiple international medalist Svitlana Piven placed 12th at the Paralympics in the shot put. They were debutants at the Games and, according to the school director, young and promising athletes.
Among past winners is Yelyzaveta Mereshko, five-time Paralympic champion.
The Deaflympic Games will take place in September 2025. The school will also have candidates – a swimmer, a wrestler and a female track and field athlete.