When Children Needed Help

Answering the Call: Helping Ukraine’s Most Vulnerable Reach Safety

When war reaches a community, its most vulnerable people often have the fewest options for getting out of harm's way. In the early weeks of the war in Ukraine, that reality became especially urgent for hundreds of orphaned children living in areas threatened by active fighting.

In 2022, Nine Line Foundation founder and Army veteran Tyler Merritt joined volunteers with Aerial Recovery Group in Ukraine, working alongside teams dedicated to evacuating orphaned children from dangerous areas and transporting them to safer locations in the western part of the country.

Among those volunteers was Ukrainian native Vlad Finn, whose connection to the mission was deeply personal. Finn had entered a Ukrainian orphanage himself at age 10 before being adopted by an American family several years later. Returning to Ukraine as a translator and volunteer, he understood in a way few others could what the children were experiencing.

The mission wasn't simply about moving children from one location to another. Volunteers worked to preserve the communities and relationships the children already had, keeping orphanage groups together whenever possible as they were relocated to safer environments.

By April 2022, the volunteer effort had helped evacuate more than 600 orphaned children.

For Merritt, whose military service had taken him into conflict zones around the world, the mission was another opportunity to put years of experience to use in service of people who needed help. But the story belongs to the children, the Ukrainian people assisting them, and the volunteers willing to enter dangerous areas to bring them to safety.

Service doesn't always happen close to home, and it doesn't always come with advance notice. Sometimes it means recognizing where your experience can help, joining others already doing the work, and going where you're needed.

For hundreds of children caught in circumstances they never chose, that willingness to serve helped provide something simple but immeasurably important: a safer place to be a child.

Read the full story from Fox News →