Sunflower donates wheelchair car for social taxi in Kherson

Sunflower Scotland donated Kia Sedona wheelchair access vehicle for social taxi service in Kherson. We donated the car to Strong Because Free – a local Kherson charity that transports older pensioners to and from hospital. This is the second wheelchair car. It was immediately put to work. We joined the team to film how social taxi works and show it to you.

Strong Because Free (Сильні бо Вільні) provides free patient transport service in Kherson. They help older people with mobility problems. Every day, the city council sends them a list of people who need to see the doctor, but who cannot get there on their own. Or those who received surgery or other medical treatment, and should be discharged and sent home.

Any trip across Kherson is extremely risky. The Russians are sending one First-person view (FPV) drone after another, in order to hunt and kill people on the streets. When we were in Kherson, Russia blew up a few minibuses. Drivers refused to go to work. Later in the afternoon, an ambulance was destroyed and burned.

Dima and his colleagues from Strong Because Free are risking their lives to help these poor people. Often they live in flats on higher floors. The boys have to carry the older people down (and then up) on their shoulders.

Kherson Social Taxi: from hospital to home

Sunflower Scotland’s team joined the social taxi for one ride. Together with the Kherson team, we took an older woman from a hospital to her home.

She could not not even stand on her feet, let alone walk. Dima lifted and sat her into a wheelchair. We wheeled it down the hospital corridors, and into the Kia Sedona which was sitting outside waiting for us.

Stevie had a drone detector on the ready. Dima strapped the wheelchair, and we started driving.

The drone detector was beeping and showing signals from the Russian drones hovering over the city. We drove as fast as possible through the near-empty streets.

Having reached the woman’s home, together with her family we wheeled the wheelchair up the stairs and put her in bed. Having exchanged a few quick words, we rushed away. It was an open area without any trees which could cover us from drones.