Anastasiia ha perso la madre e il nonno nell’attacco dei droni a Ternopil e ha cercato di saltare dal balcone per sopravvivere. Dopo diversi mesi di inferno e dolore, sta imparando di nuovo a camminare.

On November 19, 2025, the apartment building in Ternopil where Anastasiia Tsiapalo lived with her family was destroyed by a Russian missile strike. Thirty-eight people were killed, including the girl’s mother and grandfather. Anastasiia herself sustained deep burns over 15% of her body. After two months of burn treatment in Lviv, she is now undergoing rehabilitation, taking her first steps since the injury and preparing for discharge.

At dawn on November 19, 2025, Ternopil schoolgirl Anastasiia Tsiapalo was hurriedly getting dressed to go down to a shelter with her family. They didn’t make it.

“A wave of fire and smoke rushed toward me. It was very hard to breathe. My mom lost consciousness in my arms. Later I learned that she and my grandfather were killed,” the girl says.

“Everything was covered in dust, soot everywhere – straight into your eyes – and the heat on top of it. You’re walking and you don’t even know where you’re going, just hoping you’ll get out. Somehow, we still made it to the balcony, I just wanted to jump from the balcony. I thought, I’ll break my arm, so what — at least I’ll survive. Then I woke up only later, already here. [ed. – in a hospital]” 

“The child arrived in critical condition -extremely severe. She was taken straight to the operating room, where intensive infusion therapy began, along with warming, wound debridement, dressings, and stabilization.” says anesthesiologist Andreas Viatrovskyi.

Pain medication was administered every four hours, and all dressings were done under anesthesia.

“At first, it was just hell. To put it mildly. Sometimes I couldn’t even last two hours before needing pain relief again. It was completely unbearable,” Anastasiia recalls.

Due to burns to her upper and lower limbs, Nastia had to work on regaining walking skills and relearning basic daily activities.

“A whole team is working now. Our overall goal is, of course, to return to the level of activity she had before the injury – including going back to school and returning to basketball. Right now, we’re working on skills: learning again how to dress, brush her hair, eat. As a physical therapist, I work on walking function – we’re restoring it step by step,” says St. Nicholas Hospital physical therapist Serhii Khuda.

Nastia has already taken her first steps and continues to build endurance. According to the physical therapist, her goal for next week is to walk 100 meters independently.

“Thanks to her willpower and her belief in victory, she pulled herself together and is recovering very quickly. She’s amazing. She endured tremendous pain – and she managed it. The emotions are overwhelming because I saw her first steps,confident steps, really. And we hope it continues like this, that she recovers as soon as possible and walks home on her own two feet. We believe she can do it and prove to everyone that she is the strongest,” says Tetiana Nespliak, her grandma – the only close family she ha remaining

[https://suspilne.media/lviv/1220210-vtratila-mamu-dida-i-dim-ternopolanka-anastasia-capalo-robit-persi-kroki-pisla-raketnogo-udaru/](https://suspilne.media/lviv/1220210-vtratila-mamu-dida-i-dim-ternopolanka-anastasia-capalo-robit-persi-kroki-pisla-raketnogo-udaru/)