I am currently deployed to Ukraine as the Lead Training Coordinator with the United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS), working closely with an outstanding Ukrainian national counterpart to coordinate, design, and deliver all UNDSS security training across the country.
Our primary focus is SSAFE (Safety and Security in the Field Environment) training, a mandatory, once-only course for UN and partner staff operating in high-risk environments. SSAFE covers practical skills such as awareness of mines and explosive remnants of war, negotiating in difficult situations, managing movement in high-risk areas, responding to traumatic medical incidents, and — increasingly here in Ukraine — operating safely under the constant threat of missile and drone attacks.
Alongside SSAFE, I oversee medical training, particularly Individual First Aid Kit (IFAK) courses. These teach staff how to self-administer lifesaving interventions such as tourniquets and apply the MARCH protocol, addressing massive bleeding, airway and respiratory management, circulation, head traumas, and hypothermia. Hypothermia is not a theoretical concept here — it was minus 24 degrees when I was writing this. Most days I can be found mincing very carefully along the streets, performing a highly disciplined slow-motion ice ballet, because I personally know three people who have broken bones in the last two months after slipping. Staying upright has become both a professional competency and a personal ambition.
In Ukraine, IFAK refresher training is mandatory every two years. A significant part of my role is also ensuring trainers remain accredited through the UN Systems Staff College (UNSSC) in Torina, Italy. Trainers must be formally qualified through the UNSSC and maintain their accreditation by delivering IFAK and SSAFE courses regularly. I manage those processes, support trainers, and provide guidance where needed to ensure training remains consistent, relevant, and effective.
Beyond core training, I have also supported Hostile Environment Awareness Training (HEAT) for local NGOs, facilitated UNDSS senior management strategic planning workshops, and am currently developing a Ukraine-specific, women-centred safety and security course. I also design and facilitate tabletop exercises for senior managers and provide ad-hoc training and advice as operational needs arise. We sometimes travel to remote parts of Ukraine to deliver training, often in extremely challenging conditions. Advanced medical and defensive driving courses are also planned, although some had to be delayed due to ice, snow, and roads that strongly discourage optimism.
Living and working in a protracted conflict
Life in Ukraine is physically demanding. People are cold, often exhausted, and operating under constant strain. Ongoing attacks on infrastructure, power outages, limited heating, and treacherous walking and driving conditions make everyday life difficult. It is not easy — but people remain resilient, proud, and deeply determined.
What continues to impress and inspire me is the extraordinary leadership shown by Ukrainian colleagues, particularly younger humanitarians. I have met people as young as 23 who are leading NGOs right up to the front line and into heavily affected areas. They often work alongside older colleagues who bring deep life experience and wisdom — but leadership is different. These young leaders carry the ultimate responsibility for people, programmes, and assets, and that weight adds significantly to the burden on already young shoulders.
It reminds me strongly of my own time as a young military officer in my early twenties, placed into leadership roles with responsibility for people far older and more experienced than myself. The responsibilities are immense, the decisions consequential, and the consequences real — but the learning is rapid and the rewards extraordinary. I see that same combination of pressure, growth, and purpose reflected in Ukraine’s younger leaders every day.
Experience that prepared me — and what is different this time
I have worked and deployed globally with NGOs, UN agencies, and UN peacekeeping missions. I have been deployed immediately after conflicts ended and worked long-term in post-conflict and post-disaster environments. I have responded to natural disasters, including tsunamis, and spent years working amid insecurity, crime, banditry, and the long-lasting impacts of mines and explosive remnants of war.
While I have been shot at, mortared, robbed, and assaulted over the years, this is the first time I have worked inside an active war zone. Previously, I arrived after the fighting had stopped. Ukraine is different — the threat is constant, visible, and unpredictable.
Daily life here requires continuous situational awareness. Air raid sirens interrupt routine activities. Missiles and drones are sometimes visible overhead. One day, while waiting at a bus stop, another woman and I heard an air raid siren and looked up to see a missile passing directly above us. We took cover in a church doorway, waited for it to pass, and then — like everyone else — caught the bus and carried on with the day. War has a way of inserting itself into the most ordinary moments.
At night, air raids often wake me. Sometimes I get up and put my boots on. Sometimes I don’t. I measure the level of danger by whether I feel the need to put on real clothes and real shoes. It’s not in any UN manual — but it works for me.
Finding balance amid uncertainty
Despite everything, life continues. Since arriving in Ukraine, I have started flute lessons, returned to Aikido classes (a discipline I have practised around the world for many decades), and played pickleball with Ukrainian internally displaced people as part of a wellness programme supported by the Ukrainian Ministry of Health. These moments of music, movement, and laughter are not indulgences — they are essential tools for resilience in a prolonged crisis.
Why training matters more than ever (and why people keep coming back anyway)
I feel very strongly that training must be realistic and experiential. In environments like Ukraine, theory alone is not enough. In SSAFE training, we use real-life scenarios, share lived experiences and deliberately design sessions that ramp up the adrenaline — in a controlled, safe environment.
The aim is not to frighten people, but to allow them to feel pressure: elevated heart rate, cognitive overload, uncertainty, fatigue. Because when something happens for real, people do not suddenly become calm and brilliant — they fall back on what they have practised.
This approach is usually appreciated.
Sometimes… less so.
Occasionally, participants thank me for being honest and for not sugar-coating reality. Other times, they look at me as though I have personally ruined their week.
Recently, after sharing a particularly vivid real-world story during an SSAFE session, I asked, “Any questions?” One participant raised their hand and asked, with complete seriousness:
“Can you tell me again why anyone in their right mind would be a humanitarian?”
I paused.
And thought — hmm… fair question.
The truth is, humanitarian work is not easy, comfortable, or safe. But it is purposeful. It matters. And when people are properly trained — when they understand the risks, know how to respond, and trust themselves and each other — they can operate more safely, more confidently, and with far greater resilience.
We have to train hard so we can work safely. In prolonged, high-risk environments like Ukraine, good training does not just save lives in an emergency — it helps people endure, recover, and come back the next day ready to do the work again.
