Oleh Vashchyshyn was born on June 6, 1991, in the village of Selets, Dubrovytsia District. Oleh started school in 1997 and proved himself to be a disciplined and hardworking student. Moreover, he took an active part in the sport life of the school. He took football and basketball classes and participated in many district and regional competitions.
After graduation, in 2008, Oleh was called up for military service in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. There he served in a reconnaissance squadron at the military base of the city of Rivne. After military service, he worked on a construction site in Kyiv.
However, during the ATO in the eastern part of Ukraine, he was one of the first volunteers who came to protect that area in the spring of 2014. He served as an IFV gunner in the 51st mechanized infantry brigade of the 3rd battalion. During quite a short period of time, Oleh visited the hottest spots of Donetsk and Luhansk Regions. Moreover, he dealt with the most difficult situations there.
Oleh Vashchyshyn died in the Ilovaisk Cauldron at the end of August 2014. He was buried in Zaporizhzhia as an unknown soldier. However, in September 2015, according to the DNA test results, his identity was discovered. Oleh Vashchyshyn was reburied in the village of Selets, Dubrovytsia District on October 8, 2015. He had parents and a younger brother.
According to the Presidential Executive Order № 383/2016 on April 2, 2016, “for personal courage and high professionalism which were demonstrated during the defense of the state sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, fidelity to the oath of enlistment”, he was posthumously awarded the Order “For courage” III class.
Publications about Oleh Vashchyshyn
The district is in mournful dress
In the sunny October, Dubrovytsia washed away with tears again – another Hero had died in the East. It happened so that this farewell path for Oleh Vashchyshyn stretched not only for hundreds of kilometers separating our Polissia from the Donetsk Region but also for the whole year. His relatives talked with him for the last time in August.
On October 8, about a thousand of our compatriots bid farewell to Oleh Vashchyshyn, a senior soldier of the 51st individual mechanized brigade. The hero was buried in his homeland, in his native village. The heads of state administration: head Serhii Kyrkevych and the deputy chairman of the council, Hryhorii Shakh, servicemen, the ATO soldiers’ family, and five clerics arrived to share the pain of loss.
Oleh Vashchyshyn was born in 1991 in the village of Selets. In April 2014, he was called up to serve in the army. After training at the proving ground, the senior soldier went to the ATO area as a part of the 51st individual mechanized brigade. Oleh Vashchyshyn was killed in Ilovaisk Cauldron. He had parents and a younger brother.
In honor of the memory of the Hero on October 8 and 9 have been announced in his native area as mourning days .
People said their last goodbye to a fellow countryman who died near Ilovaisk
Oleh Vashchyshyn, the ATO zone serviceman, was reburied in Dubrovytsia District.
Oleh was buried in his native village Selets, Dubrovytsia District. After severe sorrows, which lasted for a year and a month, while his parents did not have the news from their son, according to the results of the DNA examination, it was determined that the soldier’s body was buried in Zaporizhzhia. Oleh died in August last year nearby Ilovaisk. The last time he spoke with his relatives by the phone was on August 28, 2014. All this time the mother had not lost the hope of seeing her son alive, because from the very beginning Oleh was found on the lists of prisoners, then as a missing one. The sad news that Oleh Vashchyshyn wasn’t alive anymore was quickly flown by not only the village but the entire district. When meeting the hero, fellow villagers, residents of the district center and neighboring settlements formed a living chain along the road that moved the column w
ith the body of the deceased soldier. With flowers in their hands and state symbols, they kneeled with respect to the hero. To conduct in the last way of the hero and defender of Ukraine came more than two thousand fellow countrymen. Among them were friends and acquaintances, district and city leaders, there were many deputies of the district council. Almost all came with flowers: they carried roses and cloves, chrysanthemums.
– Oleh Vashchyshyn gave the most valuable asset to independent Ukraine that he had – his own life, – said the head of the district administration Serhii Kyrkevych. – Oleh went to the army and became a real hero. And the heroes do not die. They live forever in our hearts and in the pages of our history. Oleh Vashchyshyn was buried with all military honors. Let’s recall, Oleh was the fifth soldier from Dubrovytsia District, who died in the ATO.
A memorial plaque of Oleh Vashchyshyn was opened
On December 17, in the village of Selets, Dubrovytsia District of Rivne Region, took place a solemn opening ceremony of the memorial plaque of the ATO hero, the true patriot of Ukraine Oleh Vashchyshyn. The initiator of the manufacture and installation of a memorable sign was the People’s Deputy of Ukraine Vasyl Yanitskyi. The event was attended by parents, fellow villagers, relatives and friends of the deceased, as well as district leadership in the person of the chairmen of the local district administration Serhii Kyrkevych and the chairman of the district council Mykola Kukharets.
People’s Deputy of UkraineVasyl Yanitskyi, addressing the audience, said: “This is the fifth memorial plaque to the dead ATO soldier
in the Dubrovytsia District. I want it to become the last in the whole of Ukraine. We do not hear explosions, because such courageous guys like Oleh are protecting us. Our children play and laugh, because their peace is guarded by patriots, ready to give life for their native land and for all of us. The volunteers and my helpers have been looking for Oleh among the prisoners for a long time. They hoped that he was alive and that he would return. He returned for real – on this memorial plaque to stay young forever. Oleh will meet children on the threshold of his native school with a king glace. And our task is to preserve the memory of the hero, to look after his parents, to build a wealthy and strong Ukraine. I bow low to the Heroes’ parents. I beg your pardon that your son is not with us.”
Those who were present honored hero’s memory with a minute of silence and laid their flowers. The prior of the local St. Nicholas Church read the prayer and sanctified the memorial plaque.
M. Slobodzin