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It is remote, inhospitable, windswept and largely uninhabited, but it has been fought over for centuries. Legend has it that the rocky outcrop in the Black Sea was created by the sea god Poseidon as a home for the greatest of all Greek warriors: Achilles. And just like the demigod, the small, cross-shaped island has seen its share of wars.
Today, the tiny piece of land is known as Snake Island (Zmiinyi Island), and on Monday Ukrainian forces raised the country’s flag there once again after seizing the island back from Russian occupiers, driven away after months of heavy bombardment.
The fight for Snake Island has strategic value, but most important it is of national significance for all Ukrainians, especially in their country’s darkest hour, with their back to the wall in Donbas. However, in the tiny fishing village of Vylkove, on the Ukrainian side of the Danube River and the closest inhabited area to the Island, the battle to regain control over this outcrop has upended the lives of inhabitants.
The intense fighting on the island between Russian and Ukrainian forces, which began on the first day of the war, has shaken the homes of villagers, in some cases opening cracks in their walls. In Vylkove, 31 miles from Snake Island, shock waves from blasts on the open sea, with nothing to absorb them, have reached the coastline.
Yuri Suslov, 43, has been fishing the waters of the Black Sea since he was a boy. “This is a very quiet town, so when they start bombing Snake Island it was very loud around here,” he said.
Yuri knows Vylkove’s channels like the back of his hand. On his boat, he navigates the narrow waterways that in the summer months resemble those of Vietnam or Cambodia. Reeds and pile dwellings line the edge of the river as children play in the water. Every family in Vylkove has a boat, the city’s principal means of transportation.
Today, Vylkove’s waterways that flow to the mouth of the Danube, giving access to the Black Sea in the direction of Snake Island, are blocked by military checkpoints, with the coast patrolled day and night.
“It’s a scary situation, but I don’t think the Russians are going to attack us,” said Yuri. “You know why? Because we are too close to Romania, and if they accidentally hit Romania, it will be Nato war.’’
Read the full story by Lorenzo Tondo: How Ukraine’s ‘Venice’ has borne the brunt of fight for Snake Island
Related: How Ukraine’s ‘Venice’ has borne the brunt of fight for Snake Island