Vitalii V. Piddubnyi (Svat)

A native of the village of Myropillya in the Krasnopil district of Sumy region, Vitaliy Volodymyrovych lived with his family in the city of Berdiansk in the Zaporizhzhia region, worked as a builder, and raised a son and a 3-year-old daughter. After the annexation of Crimea and the escalation of the situation in the East of the country, Vitaliy joined the city public formation for the protection of public order and state border "Public Guard - Self-Defense," which had over 500 activists, men and women, who made a significant contribution to preventing provocations by separatists and maintaining peace in Berdiansk. Later, he decided to take up arms to defend the state and, together with a group of fellow countrymen, joined the National Guard battalion "Donbas." His friend, "self-defender" Mykhailo Bakhtiev, recalls: "We signed up for self-defense together, set up tents, created checkpoints. After that, he said: 'Alright, everything is done here - we need to go there…'. He sensed that he would not return, told me about it, but he left to defend the Motherland…". "Kind, sensitive, always the first everywhere… A true patriot… He loved his children and wife madly, missed them… A clever, cheerful guy, an optimist who always calmed everyone down, said that everything would be fine…", this is how Vitaliy Piddubny is remembered by his comrades from "Donbas." Around 1:00 PM on July 26, while carrying out a mission to deliver food for his platoon from Artemivsk to Lysychansk, the vehicle in which Vitaliy was traveling with three friends came under fire - a burst of machine-gun fire took the man's life… The next morning, near the headquarters of the Berdiansk self-defense, a Wall of Memory for Vitaliy Piddubny was opened. People brought flowers and candles here, as well as donations for the family of the fallen hero (within just one day, activists collected over 8,000 UAH). On July 28, a civil memorial service was held here, attended by hundreds of Berdiansk residents along with relatives, friends, and comrades-in-arms. Later, a caravan of cars with blue and yellow flags escorted the vehicle with the coffin containing the body of the reservist to the city exit - his relatives decided to bury Vitaliy in his native Sumy region. But, as was said in the farewell speeches, the residents of Berdiansk will never forget their fellow countryman who gave his life to ensure that the war did not come to their city…