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Not long ago he was still lying on the beach in Thailand.
Now he is helping people on the front lines of the Ukraine war.
Nils Thal, firefighter from Nuremberg, voluntarily supports the Ukrainian firefighters in Kharkiv.
Nils Thal, fireman
"I felt bad about lying on the beach in Thailand while this was happening. That's why I decided to come here to help directly on the ground.«
He is now spending his sabbatical, which he took from his job with the fire brigade in Germany, working with his Ukrainian colleagues to extinguish houses that have been attacked by Putin's troops.
»In the beginning my father said: »Don't do that«. Just stay in Poland or drive a truck or whatever. Do what you want, but do it here in Europe, take care of the refugees, for example. For me it was so... a lot of people do it and I tried to get in touch with NGOs but there was so much bureaucracy and so much time wasted. I wrote hundreds of emails and nothing happened. So I decided to take matters into my own hands
.«
The city of Kharkiv is repeatedly under Russian fire, hundreds of civilians have been killed or injured.
Despite this, or perhaps because of this, Thal would like to continue helping in the Ukraine after his sabbatical year.
'If we want to live in a civilized world we have to do something about it, it's that simple. I'm proud to be on the right side of history. When I get home, the first thing I'll probably do is try to get unpaid leave to come back here."
