Our office was on the 12th floor of the Shark Business Center. It was great to get a smoke on the balcony and watch the traffic from such a height, and sometimes you would take with you a cup of coffee and a chatty colleague, and the work phone at the same time, so that the bosses would not swear and it seems that you are not at work at all)
It was in 2014.
The conflict in Ukraine was gathering momentum. That day I sat at work and read the summaries of the incidents, in principle, all were engaged in this, the work was neither good, nor bad. Numerous reports of as yet unarmed clashes overflowed the Internet pages.
Suddenly our accountant looked up and looked around the room with a slightly stunned look. "They say fighter planes are flying to the airport area," she said. First, no one believed, and whether it is conceivable - the airport was just recently renovated, it was a chic project for Euro 2012. And how do fighters fly there, there are people around ...?
But less than 5 minutes passed and in our large, half walled window, we saw the predatory outline of the Su-25. Of course, among us there were no air lovers, and at that time in the room except me there were some women. But it became clear to everyone that this is not civil aviation. Drying flew towards the airport.
All the peasants, who had already read the reports, ran out onto the balcony - to smoke and check whether we were imagined. Then we saw that the plane was not the only one, a few more were circling in the sky above the airport, as well as several helicopters, and the sounds of shooting and explosions were already audible.
We looked and did not believe ourselves! Before our very eyes it was destroyed, in another way you can not say, a handsome man-airport. Helicopters also took part in the destruction operation, we managed to see the moment when one of the helicopters fired off the heat traps. A fascinating and at the same time a terrible sight.
That's how the Donetsk airport ceased to exist and just appeared in the WCT, where for a long time the position war between the militia, already the DNR, and the regular units of the APU was conducted.