Following the efforts of Convoy 29 to leave the UK a few weeks earlier Convoy 29B had just as difficult birth. The plan was for two vehicles to catch a ferry from Dover one morning at the end of February. The previous day, one vehicle was still in a garage in Dorset having its suspension replaced while the other waited, fully stocked, in the East Midlands. It became clear that the former would not be loaded until late so erstwhile driver Brooke kindly agreed to do a very early run with it for an 0830 RV at a garage in Dover.
Meanwhile David would drive the other pick up over on the Thursday evening to a convoy members home in Kent for the night so that David, Julian and William could meet Brooke at the fated RV. What could possibly go wrong?
In fact David’s alternator burnt out enroute and he spent the night with the vehicle. So next morning Julian’s wife, Kate, set off to deliver Julian and William, their personal kit, a Starlink comms device, three boxes of winter warfare clothing, a large bag of home knitted blankets, homemade flapjack and a box of trench candles to the RV. There the diminished team of Brooke, Julian and Willaim met and called Tim for instructions.
After a generous gesture by Brooke, it was agreed that Julian and Will would carry on alone (hopefully not up the Khyber) and – after some rapid cross loading of tyres and other lower priority items in exchange for the Starlink, clothing etc – they narrowly made the ferry. Meanwhile Brooke and Kate headed off fully – but differently – loaded to meet David at his daughter’s house in Sevenoaks where the recovery team had dropped him.
After that the pace picked up – Convoy 29B (reduced) managed to get through Antwerp before the rush hour, getting well into Germany for the night stop, and the next day all the way to Krakow. Ants was doing a fabulous job booking hotels and, at Tim’s suggestion kept rebooking the hotel placements further East as progress was made.
On Sunday, the border crossing into Ukraine started well – incredibly Tim had identified a minor crossing where there was no queue at all. For UFC drivers used to delays of up to ten hours it was a dream come true… until William noticed that there was a problem with the oh-so-critical Ukrainian import document which had caused so much trouble in the past. Long delays had arisen on previous visits because of two digits on the form being transposed. This times the driver’s name was completely wrong! (Something not picked up on receipt and printing, late the night before)
Tim had however furnished a new form “to keep in your back pocket” and unbelievably the nice woman at customs (totally untypical of all previous experience of Ukrainian customs officials), pronounced that this was the “primary document”, had a brief consultation with her boss and Convoy 29B (reduced) rolled through.
William thought his father was exaggerating when he outlined the issues with Ukrainian driving. At the first humpback hill, Julian said “This is the perfect overtaking point for a
typical driver out here – no visibility at all”. Unimpressed William returned to studying his newly acquired burner phone only to see a car hurtle over the next hill on the wrong side as they approached the summit. More mundanely, with the pressures and resource shortages of war, there were potholes everywhere.
Lviv was charming as ever that evening. As seems usual there, it felt right out of the war, except for one or two of the sad casualties of the fighting including one who was horribly burnt. The next morning the team headed for Kiev dodging potholes on even the most major roads. Astonishingly, the police were out in strength – not looking for Russian infiltrators but wielding speeding test devices. William spotted three in four hours, fortunately in time to avoid them.
After a night in Kiev, the team met Gui Wainwright whose drone software company Julian advises in his Kiev office – the best table in the foyer of the Hilton. Gui is employing local software engineers including several wounded veterans. After an interesting update on the latest twists of drone warfare, they headed off for a meeting with UKRTAC a company set up two years before to manufacture high quality body armour – on a modular basis so the lightest version can act as a buoyancy aid and the heaviest is suitable for EOD work.
This was an extraordinary operation producing quality at scale in the most trying conditions – a semi-derelict site where the floor with women sowing has polythene on the windows to reduce drafts and the floor where the male workforce do the assembly was entirely open to the winds. It was cold in a zero temperature – what it must have been like a fortnight before when the temperature was -15C does not bear thinking about.
In the evening Julian visited some former colleagues, parliamentarians who had been taking part in an international conference to show solidarity with Ukraine on the fourth anniversary of the 2022 invasion. One of the people there was former MP Jack Lopresti now a staff officer with the elite Ukrainian Azov Brigade, coincidentally the brigade the convoy’s only vehicle was destined for.
The next morning Julian and William took the Toyota to an agreed handover point. Unfortunately, the car park entrance was completely obscured by a puddle containing a huge pothole and there was a loud bang. In fact no damage had been done – the towing hook had simply been struck to a different angle but embarrassingly, without a spanner to adjust it, that meant handing over the vehicle with a rear door which could not be opened.
The NCO from Azov was full of enthusiasm although speaking no English, but William showed him which bolt needed loosening to adjust the towbar and open the door. He seemed very pleased with the supplies and gave Julian and William each an Azov calendar. A few minutes later a contact appeared to take over the precious Starlink.
That night the team got a train to Lviv. Kiev station showed more signs of war than the streets with a number of individual soldiers in uniform travelling. Unlike the NCO that morning, most looked very tired and some had the classic thousand yard stare of a veteran. The Russians confirmed their suspicions that Kiev had been quiet because the Russians did not wish to antagonise lots of foreign politicians; while the train was enroute, Kiev was hammered and – unusually there was also a strike on Lviv damaging parts of the station.
The taxi Niyole had fixed was waiting and Niyole rang the driver to check he was on the ball as Julian and William reached him (a good effort as 0600 Ukraine time equates to 0400 GMT). The final part of the journey was in a warm minibus with friendly people but wholly innocent of seatbelts as the driver dodged the potholes on the icy road.
A final fairly typical incident demonstrated how much the Ukrainians and Polish like the Brits. There was a long queue for the foot crossing into Poland and a Ukrainian man who spoke excellent English came up from behind the Braziers in the queue. He confirmed Julian and William were Brits and then went and spoke to the Polish border guard before resuming his place at the back of the queue. The guard called the volunteers forward to join the EU queue, saving half an hour or so to get onto Polish soil for Convoy 29B (reduced)’s trip home.
Well Done Guys – great effort. Ed