A BRITISH ex-soldier was hailed by Ukraine’s president yesterday after he miraculously survived a Russian missile blitz on his secret training base.
Dan Ridley, 27, was saluted for bravely continuing to teach recruits despite the attack.
7
President Volodymyr Zelensky praised Dan and his instructors at Trident Defense Initiative — and warned the Kremlin: “Neither rain nor even Russian missiles get in the way.”
Dan, a former private in the 2nd Battalion of The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment, spent four years in the Army and later became a Ukrainian marine.
CCTV images obtained by The Sun captured the moment his HQ in Kharkiv was destroyed by five S-300 surface-to-air warheads.
He and six other heroic Brits were drilling Ukrainian troops and frontline medics at the former airbase when it came under attack.
Dan said: “We’d just finished one of our final exercises with around 100 personnel.
“Some of them were still on the firing range, the medics were finishing up and a third of us went to the local gas station 200ft away to get some food.
“We were about to leave when the first missile struck.
“You hear the missile coming after the explosion, that’s how fast they’re moving.
“I walked out of the gas station and saw a massive plume of smoke. The first two rockets came in quick succession.
“I screamed at everyone in the gas station to get down and to stay away from the windows.
“The third missile came in, I’ve got no body armour on, my helmet’s in the car, but I felt responsible for people we were training.
“I went on to the Kharkiv live Telegram channel and saw that more missiles were incoming.
“There’s a 45-second pause and I’m screaming at everyone because they thought it was over.
“After the fourth one hit the field, I sprinted toward the front gate and by the time I’d got there the fifth missile struck the concrete plate of the hangar.
7
7
“I kept running, got to my vehicle and put my body armour and helmet on and headed to the bunkers.”
Dan, originally of Croydon, South London, set up Trident Defense Initiative with other Brits and has trained 3,500 Ukraine troops so far.
He added: “We started getting people out of the bunkers.
“Me and some other guys started doing a casualty sweep. Luckily everyone was accounted for.”
Dan reckoned each of Russia’s S-300s missed their intended targets — a firing range, training base and airfield — by around 500 metres.
He bravely vowed to stay put and continue his work after the lunchtime attack on October 14.
His story emerged as Ukraine’s generals claimed 950 Russian troops had been killed in a single day — and Nato accused Moscow of “weaponising food”.
Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin suspended a deal to allow shiploads of grain to leave Ukraine after an attack on his Black Sea Fleet by hi-tech water drones.
7
7
7
Paul Sims
Source link
