They were not soldiers. But a 15-year-old Ukrainian boy and his father from a village outside of Kyiv won praise for their work to help the military. In the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Andriy Pokrasa and his father, Stanislav, used a drone to take photos of a long line of Russian tanks moving to Kyiv. The father and son then sent the photos and the location of the tanks to Ukraine’s army. Within minutes, they told the Associated Press, Ukrainian artillery shells hit and destroyed the invading forces. They said during the week of February 24, they repeatedly sent the drone up to take photos and send information to the Ukrainian military. Stanislav said he knows how to fly the drone, but Andriy is the better pilot. They knew they could have been captured or killed if Russian soldiers found out. “These were some of the scariest moments of my life,” Andriy said. The Pokrasas did not know how many targets were hit based on their information. But the father said, “There were more than 20 Russian military vehicles destroyed, among them fuel trucks and tanks.”
