Ukraine war: Soldier's life saved by mobile phone in his pocket

Mobile phone saves Ukrainian soldier’s life by stopping a BULLET from hitting him

  • Ukrainian soldier had a lucky escape from a Russian bullet on frontlines 
  • Phone the soldier was keeping in his pocket stopped round hitting him 
  • Video captures him showing off the phone and bullet to his comrade 
  • Footage emerged as heavy fighting got underway in Ukraine’s east 

A Ukrainian soldier had a lucky escape after a phone he was carrying stopped a Russian bullet amidst heavy fighting in the country’s east.

Video which appeared online Monday shows the grinning trooper – with blue tape wrapped around his arm marking him out as Ukrainian – pulling the damaged phone from his pocket and showing it to one of his comrades.

A bullet is clearly visible wedged through the screen, along with a sharp piece of metal which is thought to be part of a dog tag.  


A Ukrainian soldier had a lucky escape from a Russian bullet when it lodged in a phone he was carrying in his pocket instead of hitting him (left and right)

It is not clear exactly when or where the footage – which could not be verified by MailOnline – was filmed. 

Snow is falling, suggesting the video was not taken in recent days, as temperatures across much of eastern and southern Ukraine – where fighting has been taking place – have been mild.

According to translations of the video posted online, the soldier tells his comrade: ‘The only thing that saved my life was a phone… and a dog tag I was given.’

Plucking at the shard of metal with his finger, the other soldier responds: ‘This is a dog tag, f** it! A little bit [came] through.’

The pair then discuss the size of the bullet, which appears to be a heavier 7.62mm round compared to lighter 5.56mm ammunition that is now commonly used.

Modern Russian rifles – such as the AK-12 which appears to be the weapon of choice in Ukraine – also use 5.56, but older Soviet weapons such as the AK-47 use 7.62mm.

The soldier was filmed showing the phone to one of his fellow troops, saying it had ‘saved my life’

Sniper rifles and some lighter machine-guns also use 7.62mm ammo.

Some observers were quick to point out that the shot may have been a ricochet as it is unlikely that a phone would have stopped a direct hit.

However, ricochet bullets can still cause damage and may prove fatal – depending where on the body they strike. 

The video emerged amidst heavy fighting in Ukraine’s east today, after President Volodymyr Zelensky said an anticipated assault on the Donbas region is underway.

Russian troops heavily shelled 300 miles of frontline in the region overnight in an apparent effort to soften up defences ahead of attacks expected in the coming days.

Putin’s men retreated from Kyiv more than two weeks ago after failing to seize the capital, and has spent the days since massing forces in the east in an attempt to restart its failed invasion and score its first major battlefield victory.

Most troops are gathered at Izyum, a city spanning the Donets River some 70 miles to the south of Kharkiv, for an expected push south towards Mariupol.

If Mariupol falls to Russian forces – which is expected to take place in the coming weeks – these troops are likely to begin pushing north to join up with the Izyum force in a pincer movement.

The aim is to surround Ukrainian soldiers dug into trenches along the old Donbas frontline, where they have been fighting Russian-backed separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk since 2014.

If the Russians can pull off the manoeuvre, then those troops – known as the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) and thought to comprise a large portion of the Ukrainian army – will be cut off from supplies and vulnerable to surrender.

Should Russia succeed in surrounding and forcing the surrender of JFO troops, then it would provide a huge propaganda boost to the Kremlin and one of its stated war aims – the ‘liberation’ of Donbas from Ukrainian control.

Depending on how many troops Russia loses in the process, the victory could also prompt Putin to reposition his forces for fresh attacks against Ukrainian cities to the west – Kharkiv, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv and possibly Odesa and Kyiv.

Such a move would drag the war out for many months – possibly years – and put the survival of Ukraine as a sovereign state under threat.

But if Ukraine emerges victorious, it would deal a hammer blow to Russia’s invasion plans and deny Putin any conceivable path to victory.

As happened with the stalled offensive around Kyiv, defeat for Russia would leave its occupying forces vulnerable to Ukrainian counter-attacks and could prompt a retreat back into rebel-controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk, and into Crimea.

Depending on how many troops Ukraine has left after the battle, it could also open up the possibility of attacks into those previously-occupied regions with the aim of returning them to Ukrainian control – which Zelensky has stated as one of his aims.

Such a catastrophic loss would be difficult even for Putin’s regime to explain to the Russian people, and it is open to debate whether he could survive the backlash.  

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