Vitalii V. Zinchenko (Akhim)

Zinchenko Vitaliy Vitaliyovych was born on February 13, 1995, in the village of Ustyvytsia, Myrhorod district, Poltava region. He had a twin brother, Valentyn. In 2012, he graduated from the Ustyvytsia Secondary School of I-III degrees, and the following year he went on a contract military service to the Internal Troops, which he served in a military unit in Poltava. In 2015, he entered the National Academy of the National Guard of Ukraine (Kharkiv), after graduating from which he was sent to Zolochiv, Lviv region, as a teacher at the National Guard training center. In September 2020, he was transferred to the OZSP "Azov" in Mariupol. In 2021, on the occasion of the next anniversary of the liberation of Mariupol, he was awarded the Order "For the Security of the People", and in June 2021, Vitaliy Zinchenko was promoted to the rank of senior lieutenant. From the first days of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, he stood up to defend Mariupol. He became famous for destroying two enemy tanks in one day. On April 30, 2022, he was promoted to the rank of major. He was killed on May 5, 2022, in a battle with Russian invaders on the territory of the Azovstal plant as a result of the explosion of an enemy tank shell. He covered his comrade with his body, and he himself received fatal shrapnel wounds. He is survived by his parents, grandmother, and brother. For personal courage and selfless actions in defending the state sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, loyalty to the military oath, Vitaliy Vitaliyovych Zinchenko was posthumously awarded the Order of Courage of the III degree.