"Russia's Dnepr Group of Forces serviceman Alexander Rochev with the call sign 'Lis' appeared to be very lucky after he escaped death being seriously wounded under enemy fire. The soldier shared his story when he had returned to his senses after he was already considered dead and taken to the morgue. Archival video footage from the hospital shows scars on Rochev's body, while footage shot on January 21 features him walking in a park and recounting how he found himself on the brink of death. In 2024, Rochev received his first serious combat mission: to secure a position in Mirny of the Zaporozhye region. The enemy spotted the group almost immediately: heavy artillery and mortar fire began, as well as attacks by drones. Alexander managed to hide in a shelter, but a fellow serviceman running nearby stepped on a mine. Shrapnel hit Rochev in the arm and leg. A serviceman with the call sign 'Skrudzhi' took part in evacuating Rochev from under fire. In an interview recorded on February 17, the soldier recounted how Rochev, bleeding heavily, fought for his life while his comrades carried him to the vehicle. "Lis was feeling unwell and starting to fall unconscious: he was closing his eyes and his tongue was going numb. We tried, of course, to keep in contact with him the whole way. I thought we had to do something, so I ran to look for water. I ran about 100 metres downhill and found some people," 'Skrudzhi' said. "They were good men, three of them volunteered to help. So we quickly carried Lis to the evacuation point. <...> He held up well, he was brave, he was alive." At the hospital, doctors could not feel Rochev's pulse, so he was sent to the morgue, where he regained consciousness. "I came to myself, lying on a metal table, a nurse standing nearby with a hose was pouring [water] on me. They were washing me apparently as I was covered in blood, dirt, all that stuff. I remember her shouting: Doctor, doctor!" Rochev shared his first memory after his 'resurrection'. The medics immediately began examining him. The soldier tried hard to show signs of life by moving his pupils. "I heard the nurses pushing me around on the trolley to the CT scan. I heard them discussing that my brain activity was on, but that I wasn't coming round. Then another doctor arrived from Sevastopol," Rochev described the situation. "He removed the bandage from my eye, opened my pupil and looked at me. I looked at him and could already see his silhouette. <...> He said, 'Are you awake?' I moved my pupils: up and down, up and down. <...> [The doctor] looked at me and yelled: 'Breathe, breathe!' I was like [inhaled]. Alright, he said, he will survive." Being in Sevastopol's intensive care unit, Rochev called his wife, but she barely recognised her husband. The woman had been mourning Alexander for four days, choosing a grave place, and would have sooner believed that he was calling her from the afterlife than from the hospital. "She couldn't understand who it was - it wasn't my voice. I was all swathed in wires [around my neck], so my voice sounded completely different. I said: 'Why aren't you picking up?' She still couldn't understand who it was. I said: 'Zhenya, what's wrong with you? Don't you recognise your husband?" Rochev recounted their conversation. 'Skrudzhi' said that he experienced indescribable feelings upon hearing the news that his friend was alive. Over two years of service, his colleagues had become truly close to him, just like family. "There was a call from the hospital, that he was cargo-200, he was dead. It was hard for me because I had lived together with him for two years, we got along well, like brothers," he revealed. "My mates and I were sitting around the table when his wife called and said he was alive. We were just shocked. <...> I ran upstairs and started shouting to the whole company over the radio that he was alive," he said. Rochev is currently undergoing treatment, and doctors note positive progress. The serviceman intends to return to service a little later, but for now he is assisting medical staff in the medical unit. For his courage and selflessness, Alexander Rochev has been awarded the Zhukov Medal and the Medal for Bravery. Moscow launched a military offensive in Ukraine in late February 2022 after recognising the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR), claiming that Kiev had failed to guarantee their special status under the 2014 Minsk Agreements, and urging Ukraine to declare itself officially neutral and give assurances that it would never join NATO. Kiev denounced the Russian action as an invasion. Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky imposed martial law throughout the country, announcing a general mobilisation, while the EU and the US imposed several rounds of sanctions on Moscow."