Basil Segos, director of the New York Department of Environmental Conservation, said he was “pulled” to volunteer after watching the war unfold.
“In this brutal war, even though civilians are routinely killed, people are uniting for democracy and their own autonomy,” Segos said. “I wanted to do what I could to help”
Seggos took a leave of absence from his DEC post to drive an ambulance across the border from Slovakia to Kyiv for the non-profit Ukraine Friends.
Segos is now back at work in Albany. He spoke with his NCPR’s David Sommerstein about his experiences in Ukraine. Their dialogue has been lightly edited for clarity.
Basil Sego: It came down to the need for an ambulance driver. We literally needed someone from Slovakia and Poland to transport ambulances donated from Europe and America to this country. So I raised my hand and got in and became an ambulance driver for two weeks.
David Summerstein: that’s what you did. did you drive the ambulance?
Segoth: Hooray. We gathered in Slovakia and crossed the border. About 13 hours drive from the Slovak border to Kyiv in a convoy of about 20 ambulances. And a few days later we had a little ceremony that effectively handed over all these ambulances (44 in total) to both the Ministry of Health and the Territorial Defense Force. Country.
Ukraine is a beautiful European country. So Kyiv itself has the character of a beautiful European capital, and looking at it, you can see many villages around it desolate. You can certainly get it from the news, but look at it firsthand and see literally hundreds of miles of villages being flattened and civilians being targeted. It is impossible not to feel.
Chantal Mistral Bernard
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NCPR
Summerstein: You are New York’s top environmental officer. So what did you see through the lens of your environmental brain when you were in Ukraine?
Segoth: Yeah I mention that devastation and see the outskirts of Kyiv where much of it is flattened, Bucha, et al. saw. In other words, it is difficult not to see environmental degradation.
It is the complete destruction of water infrastructure, sewage and energy grids. The landscape itself was shattered. So it’s just shattered with waste, debris, rocket parts, and unexploded ordnance. I mean, once they get the upper hand, it’s going to take a generation to wipe this out, and a generation if there’s a rebuild.
I mean, I certainly saw Storm Sandy ten years ago. I have seen other affected areas. Many years ago I was in Haiti after an earthquake. But to see it on this scale across thousands of square miles? Yes, it will have to be rebuilt, but the landscape itself will be a big challenge.
Summerstein: You came back from a few days ago. What stories do you keep telling over and over again when talking to friends and family?
Segoth: the only anecdote [a conversation with] A young individual helping part of the reconstruction.
There is a huge amount of brain drain. And when the Russians attacked Ukraine, the unkilled civilians fled west or fled to Europe. And now there is a great need to bring those people back in. Young people are helping with that.
I’m very inspired by this kind of pop-up advocacy group. One of them focused on shelters and displaced persons and made every possible effort to implement these policies to bring Ukrainians back to the country. Some of these decimated areas can be repopulated.
I told him “You really are the future of this country, aren’t you? And he said to me, ‘No, we are this generation.’
That it’s literally an entire country, children in factories, heaters in buildings, young activists making their way back into the country for those who have fled, soldiers on the front lines, is something that sticks with me. Say, the line that was watching and defending all of our freedom and democracy.
Stories like this are important to our community.
So for me, it’s something that’s stuck with me for the rest of my life. And I think it should be something that everyone can relate to.
