When the soldier codenamed Blackbird was bundled into the back of the rescue robot, wrapped in a sleeping bag and bound with bloodied tourniquets, his life hung in the balance.
One leg was gone and the other was shattered, looking more like a burned branch than flesh and bone. His right arm, too, was smashed.
If his wounds did not kill him, the cold might have done so. It was minus 10C on the front line south of Kostiantynivka in the darkness of Sunday evening, even without the windchill. From time to time, gusts of snow blew across the robot’s camera.
