“Everybody on board was a foreigner and had nothing to do with the conflict here in Ukraine.” These are the words of Simon Ostrovsky, a correspondent for Vice News who has been reporting from Ukraine since the start of the region’s conflict.
Ostrovsky was among one of the first journalists to reach Hrabove in the Donetsk Region of Ukraine, the site of the crash where Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 went down after being hit by a missile.
In a video report he filed for Vice News, Ostrovsky believes that it will be very difficult to ascertain what exactly happened as the plane went down in an active war zone where the geopolitical situation is murky.
“To have an impartial investigation, that can safely conduct it’s work is going to be very difficult to do,” he says in the video.
In the video report, footage of rescue workers and villagers looking shocked and speechless at the sight of dead bodies strewn across fields and farms are very haunting indeed.
Most of the villagers described that they heard a loud hum in the air before seeing debris falling into their homes and gardens from the air followed by dead bodies.
“They (the bodies) were flying towards me… then they flipped above me and started falling. I thought they were bombs,” said one lady who had invited Ostrovsky to see her garden.
In the Vice News video report as well, a group of coal miners who work nearby took it upon themselves to assist in figuring out the situation and to help in searching for bodies.
“It’s war that’s happening, the fighting. The war against civilians,” one of the members told Ostrovsky.
Many of the local people that he spoke to in the area expressed that hopefully, this tragic event could shed more light onto the conflict that has happened and that it could end before more innocent lives are lost.
Ostrovsky was among one of the first journalists to reach Hrabove in the Donetsk Region of Ukraine, the site of the crash where Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 went down after being hit by a missile.
In a video report he filed for Vice News, Ostrovsky believes that it will be very difficult to ascertain what exactly happened as the plane went down in an active war zone where the geopolitical situation is murky.
“To have an impartial investigation, that can safely conduct it’s work is going to be very difficult to do,” he says in the video.
In the video report, footage of rescue workers and villagers looking shocked and speechless at the sight of dead bodies strewn across fields and farms are very haunting indeed.
Most of the villagers described that they heard a loud hum in the air before seeing debris falling into their homes and gardens from the air followed by dead bodies.
“They (the bodies) were flying towards me… then they flipped above me and started falling. I thought they were bombs,” said one lady who had invited Ostrovsky to see her garden.
In the Vice News video report as well, a group of coal miners who work nearby took it upon themselves to assist in figuring out the situation and to help in searching for bodies.
“It’s war that’s happening, the fighting. The war against civilians,” one of the members told Ostrovsky.
Many of the local people that he spoke to in the area expressed that hopefully, this tragic event could shed more light onto the conflict that has happened and that it could end before more innocent lives are lost.
