The Pressure of Duty

Ukrainians arriving at the railway station in Przemyśl, 2 March 2022 r.

The peak occurred in March, in two waves. Fifty thousand refugees passed through the city every day. Just imagine what would have happened if the trains to take these people further into Poland had not arrived.

Wojciech Bakun in an interview with Paulina Nowosielska

How far is it from Przemyśl to the Polish-Ukrainian border?

About 10 km. Depends on how you count - from city limits or from the city centre.

Have you ever thought that you would have to deal with the consequences of a war being fought so close to your city?

No. Even in the darkest scenarios, I never thought that a full-scale armed conflict would break out, with rockets falling on Lviv, 80 km from Przemyśl, on the first day, causing a massive influx of refugees. Although, within the framework of the crisis management plans that cities prepare, we had such a scenario as well.

And did it turn out to be like the defence training classes we used to have ‒ theoretical training that has to be completed but which will never be of any use?

A bit, yes. The situation quickly tested our preparedness. It became clear that crisis management plans have to be like a script to which you break the seal and step by step implement the scenario contained therein. And let me put it this way: we tested ourselves which aspects of these plans worked and which did not.

Meaning?

What worked was creating temporary shelters in case of a mass population movement. Schools were prepared for this. A quick notice was enough for the city's education department to contact the directors of the educational institutions, who became responsible for setting up the dormitories. And what didn't work ‒ or at least not immediately? We had not developed rules for coordinating the work of the volunteers. And we are not talking about a dozen or so people ‒ over two and a half thousand volunteers worked every day in Przemyśl, a city with a population of sixty thousand.