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These premises should be airtight. If we are talking about the fund of shelters for the population, it is necessary that they are airtight and have the things I have listed. This can be done by the balance holder. If we are talking about communal housing, it should probably be done by the housing office. Residents can also equip what else they want to have there.

In any case, when an air raid warning is announced, everyone should go to a shelter. A shelter is the safest place to protect your life. The rule of two walls can be used if the shelling caught a person out of the blue. For example, when there was no air raid alert or the person didn’t hear it. Only in such cases can you use the two-wall rule in your home. But once again, I emphasise that in case of any air raid, people should go to a designated shelter.

If a person stays in the house and the shelling has started, if he or she didn’t head for the shelter, then we use the two-wall rule in our apartment. These can be two load-bearing walls, or a doorway. There should be no glass in these places, so that the glass broken by the shock wave doesn’t hurt. It would be good to have a mobile phone with you. In case the building collapses, this way a person can try to notify that he or she is still under the rubble.

According to the regulations and what we have seen, it is impossible to set up a shelter in an apartment. Unless you have an emergency suitcase with you, which you should take with you and go to a shelter during an alarm.

The only safe place to hide is the space underground.

If you don’t have time to go to a shelter, use the two-wall rule. Not all residential buildings have safe bathrooms: in block-type buildings, particularly in older buildings, they can’t be considered safe. These are 4 blocks that are inserted inside the building and if the building collapses, these blocks can fold. And between the load-bearing walls, even if the wall slab falls, there will be a small amount of space in this gap where you can stay and not be covered with building materials. 

The bathroom is safe if there are certain structural elements, if the building is not a block type.

Window openings are dangerous because they fly out into the apartment during a shock wave.

If we are talking about basements and ground floors, the requirements state that communication pipes of a residential building should not pass through these premises. This is because in case of a building collapse or other emergency, people who will be in this space will be flooded with hot or cold water when the pipe breaks. Therefore, the regulations prohibit communications from passing through the premises of the simplest shelters.

In an apartment building, it is better to take the stairs because the lift may be blocked due to a power outage.

And it will not be safe. Therefore, if you live in such regions, you should only go down the stairs.

First, you need to try to somehow inform people that you are under the rubble. It can be a mobile phone: call 101 or 102 and report that you are there. If you don’t have a mobile phone, it can be a rescue tool if you can move your hands freely. Then find some kind of building structure, perhaps a pipe or panel, to let people know you are under the rubble. When rescuers are working, they stop every hour. They announce 10 minutes of silence and listen to see if there are any people who can give a signal about themselves. Then the rescuers know where to search.

Perhaps you can move around on your own, and you have tools at hand, and you know the layout of the building, where there is a possible exit. Then you can try to free yourself from the rubble.

If it’s an apartment, it’s better to wait for the rescuers to come and do the job and get you out. Because you can hurt yourself even more on your own. 

You should only try to get out on your own if you are sure it is safe to do so.

During any rescue operation, a headquarters is set up to help professionals find all the people as quickly as possible. We talk to those in the building who may know who is left, make lists, try to contact them by mobile phone, and at the beginning of the rescue operation we have an approximate idea of how many people are left under the rubble.

In my practice, there has never been a case when rescuers didn’t come to a house. In Kyiv, we had massive shelling, and there were many locations at the same time – rescuers always went to all calls as quickly as possible.

No. In any case, you need to inform the rescuers and wait for them and the medical service. Because you don’t know what kind of injuries they have and whether your actions will not cause them even more harm.