"Terror" is the word Olha uses to describe life in the Ukrainian frontline city of Oleshky over the past few years.
She, her husband Viacheslav, their immediate family and their dog got off a long-distance bus and arrived in Chernihiv Oblast, Ukraine. "We came back from hell," Vyacheslav said.
The couple were among hundreds of residents evacuated from Russian-occupied Oreshki. They entered northern Ukraine via Belarus on Saturday (October 31), and many of them were reunited with relatives they had not seen for years.
Oreshki was occupied by Russian troops in the early stages of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. One side of the city is bounded by the Dnipro River, and the other side is controlled by Russian troops.
Olha and Vyacheslav have been living there with their children, who are in their 30s. Even as shelling intensifies around them, they worry that escaping will be more dangerous because evacuation routes are littered with mines and may be targeted by drones.
With supplies becoming increasingly scarce, the pair said they attempted to cross minefields in search of food earlier this month.
"People are stepping on landmines, dying and being maimed, just trying to survive," Olha told the BBC.
Those who stayed in the city, fearful of going out, had to survive by cooking wild grass from their gardens, she said.
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"We saw that the situation was not improving, so we realized we had to leave," Olha said.
The opportunity for the evacuation came earlier this week.
A humanitarian ceasefire brokered by US first lady Melania Trump took effect in the Kherson region, bringing several days of peace for the first time in four years and allowing residents of Oreshki to evacuate.
It is believed that as many as 6,000 people, including 200 children, still lived in Oreshki and the surrounding area at that time, of which about 1,700 were in the city.
Residents were given a four-hour evacuation window on Friday. The authorities arranged a fleet of 25 buses to pick up up to 750 evacuees, and provided ambulances for those with limited mobility.
The evacuated residents first traveled through the Russian-controlled areas to southern Russia, then flew to Belarus, and arrived at a military installation in Chernihiv Oblast by bus on Saturday.
On the tarmac, evacuees completed the registration process before heading to other destinations. Some elderly people are weak and need to be carried on stretchers.
It was an emotionally intense reunion for many.
Dasha and Anya thought they might never see their father, Mykhailo Palii, again. When they saw their father arrive, they cried and screamed and ran across the tarmac to greet him.
After an emotional hug, Paliyi described life in Oreshki, but he said that he had previously hidden many details from his family.
"There was a big hole blown out of the bathroom," he said.
"There are drone attacks here, there are missile attacks. These things do happen, but I don't tell them because I know they will be worried."
Couple Tetiana and Volodymyr arrived in Chernihiv with a cat in their arms. They said their house was completely burned down three years ago and they have been living in a house abandoned by a neighbor since then.
It is not difficult for them to leave once there is an opportunity to safely evacuate.
"We have nothing to miss. We have no relatives there. The children are married and do not live with us in the city," said Jitiana.
But even those who manage to escape still miss those who stayed.
"There are still a lot of people out there living in that environment," Olha said.
Now, after leaving Oreshki, evacuees face another challenge: deciding where to go next and how to rebuild their lives.
Palliy said he would look for work to support his family.
"There's no job I can't do. Digging, hoeing, planting, building construction, I can even do demolition work."
Olha said that she and her family have no relatives elsewhere in Ukraine, so they will temporarily rely on some acquaintances before getting back on their feet.
She said:
"If we can survive in hell, we can certainly survive here."
This article was originally written in English. We used artificial intelligence to assist in translation and was reviewed by BBC journalists before publication. Learn more about how we use artificial intelligence.
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