Yurii Itkaliuk was born on April 23rd, 1966, in Rudleve, Mlyniv Raion, Rivne Oblast. Having finished Vovnychi School, he entered Demydivka Vocational School №25, where he obtained a tractor driver and an engineer qualification. Yurii grew up without a father. Thus hard work of an agricultural worker lay on the child’s shoulders.
After military service, Yurii decided to become a serviceman. He finished The School of Ensigns, served in Czechoslovakia, Kaliningrad, and Odesa.
Shortly after that, Yurii came back home. At first, he worked as a driver on a collective farm. Later he became a mechanic in a car fleet. Yurii raised two sons Ivan and Borys, as actual Ukrainians, diligent and hard-working people in a happy family. He worked as a tractor driver in Vovnychi Village Council.
As a soldier and patriot, Yurii Itkaliuk was mobilized. After the training and the re-training in Yavoriv, Lviv Oblast, and Kryvyi Rih, he fought at the Zone of Counter-terrorist Operation in Luhansk Oblast. Yurii fought for his sons, wife, calm, and peace. He fought till his last breath.
The 48-year-old tank driver Yurii Itkaliuk died on February 4th, 2015. His tank came under fire while accomplishing a combat mission.
According to the Presidential Executive Order №, 282/2015 on May 23rd, 2015, Yurii Itkaliuk was posthumously awarded the Third Class Order For Bravery “for valor and high professionalism demonstrated in the protection of the state sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, loyalty to the oath of enlistment.”
Heaven took him
Last year in August, the 48-year-old Yuriy Itkalyuk from Vovnychi joined the military campaign with the words, “I go to the war, so young people do not die in that hell.” On February 4th this year, the sad news came to the village: the undermining of the tank during the combat task in eastern Ukraine, the mechanic-driver of the tank battalion, Yuriy Itkalyuk, was killed. Heroic death. Thousands of locals escorted the knight of their motherland to his final resting place.
For four months from now, the hero has returned to the thresholds of his ninety-year-old, where in 1981 a cheerful blond boy went to the world wide. He returned lying on a memorial board installed in honor of a warrior who defended Ukraine, risking his life. Pastor of the Holy Cross-Vozdvizhenska church, Mykola consecrated the
monument board, emphasizing that Yuriy Itkalyuk fulfilled what God has commanded to the motherland, so we will pray Almighty God to teach everyone to love God, the homeland, and the family.
On the line-requiem in Vovnickiy school, there was enough sorrow and sadness. The whole village was in grief, and most of the fellow villagers came to a sorrowful event to honor a courageous fellow villager, to support his wife, sister, sons, and family. Alla Cherniy, Head of the Raion State administration, bowed lowly, noting that a single word does not compensate for the pain of loss of the beloved one. So she urged everyone to help each other carry their burden in this challenging time and thanked them for the great patience of those worried about the whole of Ukraine. Today about three hundred of our compatriots have been mobilized for military service, so the Head of the Raion has urged to pray God for all of them to return to their homes alive and healthy, to support the three dozen boys and men who were called from the eastern front, whose sons, brothers, men are protecting Ukraine in the Donbas now. And the memorial board to Yuri Gerasymovych will be a spiritual guide for anyone who will cross the threshold of the school.
People’s deputy of Ukraine, Oleksandr Dekhtyarchuk, noted that this is the 16th memorial board to the dead heroes from his constituency. At such events, it is hard to look into relatives’ eyes, fellow villagers. Still, memorable boards attempt to educate new generations who will live in the country without hypocrisy, lies, treason, bribery, corruption. It is this country that needs to be built.
The parliamentarian stressed that our enemy is Putin and Russian racist hatred ideology, in which there is no room for human kindness, warmth, and understanding. Still, there is a desire to restore the empire, to capture the world. But this will not happen: Ukraine will stop it, and the world will not allow it.
Assistant-counselor of People’s Deputy Petro Rukher stressed that today, as never before, we need unity and support. The faint memory of those who died for Ukraine will be eternal.
Valentine Sunichuk and Lyudmila Borschuk did not add to the atmosphere of the grieving event: one had been teaching Yuri, the second – his age. They urged that, in the memory of fellow villagers, he would see a cheerful, sincere, hard-working, kind, humane, decent, and in fact, one that remained until the last breath on earth.
Deputy Speaker of the Rayon Council Grygoriy Parfenyuk, Head of the Department of Education of the Rayon State Administration Valeriy Feha, Head of the Department of Culture and Tourism of the Rayon State Administration Tetyana Trotsyuk, and Village Chairman Ivan Oliynyk spoke about Yuriy, his feat and place of the hero in our life. Sincere words about the brother, wrapped in heart pain, and sister of the knight of Ukraine Tamara Mykolayivna also spoke.
From Vovnychi, a soldier’s antimony called for a fight Sergei Sanchuk, Vasyl Bondarchuk, Alexander Goncharuk, Yuri Manuilchik, Igor Klodnitsky, Alexei Bugay, Roman Korovitsky against the Russian-terrorist invasion. Unfortunately, only Yuriy Itkalyuk did not come back to his native house, his wife, sons, sisters, fellow villagers because heaven had taken him. Eternal memory to you, hero!
Freedom Cost: 48-years-old tankman Yuriy Itkalyuk from Mlyniv Raion had no time to show his family the sea.
He fought for his sons and his beloved wife. He fought for calm and peace in his small village of Vovnychi to every last.
48-years-old tankman Yuriy İtkalyuk from Mlynivshchyna died on February 4th. His tank got under artillery battles while performing combat missions. Two shells flew past him; the third hit the hatch – his brothers tell. Yuriy had a professional training since the Soviet era.
He served in the army for eight years in the Czech Republic. Upon return, he met his future wife, Mariya.
That’s how Yuriy and Mariya together started to build a small village farm in Vovnychi. Yuriy worked as a mechanic at various enterprises and later began to go to work in the capital.
They were married for 22 years. They brought up two sons – Ivan and Boris, who were taught to work. Yuriy often said to his son – You can win people’s respect by a good attitude and a good deed.
Boris says that Yuriy sometimes regretted that he did not continue to engage in military affairs. Always and in everything, he wanted to be a real man. Yuri was fond of fishing. He often walked with a fishing rod to a pond that was next to his home. But he wanted to show his family a bigger pond – to show the sea. Yuriy’s comrades found friendly support and solace in communicating with him.
It is the usual thing for Vovnychi to keep the heroes. The old-timers had a memory of how fierce fighting was taking place in the territory of Vovnychi of the Second World War. There are three mass graves in Vovnychi, Rudleve, and Krasne, numbering about 500 deaths. All of them died because of a tragic mistake. They shot their own – in their own. To ensure that the native village was not again the front line, Yuriy İkatlyuk gave his life.
The feat of father – an order to sons
On the instructions of the President of Ukraine, the Head of the Mlynivskiy Raion state administration, Alla Cherniy, presented the Order “For the Courage” of the III degree to Ivan and Boris Itkalyuk – to the sons of the deceased in th
e Donbas in February this year, Yuriy Itkalyuk from Vovnychi. This high state award, the tankman-hero, is awarded for the courage found during the protection of Ukraine, its state sovereignty, and territorial integrity from the Russian-terrorist aggression in the east of our country. Alla urged the sons of the glorious warrior to remember the hero’s feat, to follow courageous temperament.
The Head of the RSA gave Yuriy’s wife the Law of God – a book that sheds light on the spiritual truths. At the same time, the Raion leader asked to pray for the repose of Yuriy’s soul, all who feel a spiritual affinity with the person who gave life for us, for Ukraine.
Valery Kuderchuk, the captain of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, a serviceman of the Mlynivskiy Raion Executive Committee, presented the widow of Yuriy Itkalyuk with a certificate of the right to benefits. Alla Cherniy, First Deputy Head of the Raion State Administration Yuriy Melnyshyn, village chairman Ivan Oliynyk discussed a range of vital issues with relatives of the deceased hero.
The fellow villagers and the family of Yuriy Itkalyuk took part in the award ceremony.
Glory to the heroes! Glory to Ukraine!
The hero has come alive in the picture
Nina Augustine, the artist from Mlyniv, went to the final line in the creation of a series of portraits from the cycle “Ukraine’s Golgotha, “in which she captured the faces of those killed in the zone of the ATO in the east of Ukraine, the fellow countrymen: Maxym Lyashuk from Ostrozhets, Petro Polytsyak from Borbyn, Oleksiy Kirys and Roman Galas from Mlyniv, Yuriy Itkalyuk from Vovnich. Recently Nina completed a Yuriy Itkalyuk, who perished in the Russian-Ukrainian war on February 4th, 2015.
Envelope Yuri Gerasimovich Itkalyuk was mobilized in the army in August 2014, served in the 17th Panzer Brig
ade. On February 4th, 2015, he repelled the Russian armed formations, covering Ukrainian units. One of the shells sent by the enemy hit the tank hatch where our fellow countryman was.
For the courage and heroism, revealed during the defense of state sovereignty, territorial integrity of Ukraine, loyalty to the military oath, Yuriy Itkalyuk was posthumously awarded the Order “For the Courage of the Third Class,” the breastplate “For the Defense of the Luhansk Airport.”
The painting of Nina Augustine is exhibited in the “Gallery of creative bosom” of the reading room of the central Raion library. The artist from the Raion center intends to complete the cycle “Golgotha of Ukraine” with the portrait of Olexander Kravchuk from Arshichin: protecting the Donetsk airport; in January 2015, the “cyborg” disappeared …
Returned on the picture
T
he ceremony of transfer the portrait of the deceased in the east of Ukraine, Yuriy Itkalyuk, from Vovnychi, took place in Mlyniv St. Michael’s Church.
During the solemn ceremony, the rector of the temple, Taras Varvaruk, found words that exalted the feat of the victorious fellow countryman, added courage and perseverance to Yuriy’s wife Mariya, his sons and his sister Tamara and spiritual assessment of the greatness of their beloved one’s death.
