{"id":665474,"date":"2025-12-31T21:29:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T21:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/665474\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T21:29:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T21:29:12","slug":"we-live-with-war-over-our-heads-the-romanian-villagers-threatened-by-russian-drones-romania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/665474\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We live with war over our heads\u2019: the Romanian villagers threatened by Russian drones | Romania"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the edge of Romania\u2019s Danube delta on the border with Ukraine<\/a>, in the village of Plauru, cows graze in flat, marshy fields. Houses with blue-painted roofs and window frames line a dirt track, many shuttered or abandoned.<\/p>\n

Residents can see the cranes and silos of Izmail, a Ukrainian port city separated from Plauru by the 300 metre-width of the Danube River. By day the scene is deceptively calm. But sometimes, after dark, that calm dissolves.<\/p>\n

The hum of drones cuts through the night, followed by explosions that rattle windows and shake people out of their beds.<\/p>\n

For the 500 or so people in Ceatalchioi commune, which includes Plauru and three other villages, the war in Ukraine is not something they watch from a distance, but a daily reality.<\/p>\n

Map<\/a><\/p>\n

As Russia targets Ukrainian port infrastructure along the Danube, Romanian villages squeezed against the border have found themselves on the frontline of a conflict in which they are not fighting.<\/p>\n

Drone debris has repeatedly landed on Romanian territory, raising uncomfortable questions for Nato\u2019s easternmost communities about security, escalation and how long civilians can be expected to live under constant threat.<\/p>\n

Ceatalchioi and its villages are connected to the outside world by a single dirt road that winds to Tulcea, the nearest city. Beyond that, people must take a ferry to cross the Danube. The road is deeply rutted and pocked with potholes, barely passable in places.<\/p>\n

Tulcea, the largest Romanian city closest to the Ukrainian border and through which the Danube passes. Photograph: Andrei Popoviciu\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than three years we have lived with war over our heads. Some areas in Ukraine do not have the level of stress that we have here,\u201d said Tudor Cernega, the mayor of Ceatalchioi commune. \u201cWe are on the hotline. Practically, we are part of the war too.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Cernega, the lack of a paved road is not just an inconvenience but a safety risk, slowing evacuations and deepening the commune\u2019s isolation.<\/p>\n

That risk became urgent in November, when a Russian drone struck a Ukrainian ship carrying liquefied gas in Izmail, setting it on fire. Fearing an explosion, Romanian authorities evacuated people from Plauru and Ceatalchioi, transporting them to Tulcea. Some left reluctantly, insisting on feeding their animals first.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was to be expected that this moment would come,\u201d Cernega said. \u201cWe have been subjected to this terror for more than three years now. God forbid a drone falls on a house.\u201d<\/p>\n

A photograph taken from the Romanian side of the border on the Danube shows a cargo ship loaded with LPG on fire after Russian strikes on Izmail, Ukraine. Photograph: AP<\/p>\n

Villagers say fragments of drones have repeatedly fallen in nearby fields and wetlands since the invasion began. While no one has been killed, the incidents have unsettled communities that already feel cut off and neglected.<\/p>\n

Adriana Giuvanovici, 71, lives alone in Plauru. Her husband died two years ago of heart problems, and her children live in Tulcea. She was in the city\u2019s hospital when the evacuation happened but has no plans to leave the only home she has known.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hear loud noises and bombs every now and again,\u201d she said, standing in her yard. \u201cWe got used to it, but of course we are afraid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Across the commune, fear, but also habit, have become routine. Georghe Boftea and his neighbour Mititelu Petrea were evacuated last month.<\/p>\n

Gheorghe Boftea (left) and Mititelu Petrea say they got used to the sounds of bombs from over the Danube and do not want to ever leave their village of Plauru. Photograph: Andrei Popoviciu\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cYou live in fear because you don\u2019t know where the next drone will fall,\u201d Boftea said. \u201cWe are just a few hundred metres from Ukraine. The sirens, the bombs, you hear everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boftea relies on subsistence farming, raising cows, pigs and chickens. For him, leaving is not only an emotional issue but a practical one. Animals still need feeding, even when the village has to be evacuated.<\/p>\n

Marius Morozov, who works at Ceatalchioi town hall, said that when the war started in 2022 there were far fewer explosions. \u201cThere were maybe five to seven per evening,\u201d he said. \u201cNow sometimes it can be more than 50 in a night, they come more often.\u201d<\/p>\n

He tries to joke about it with friends, betting on how many drones will fall the following night, but the exhaustion shows. \u201cSometimes you don\u2019t sleep all night because of the bomb noises, and then you still have to come to work the next day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marius Morozov, an employee at Ceatalchioi city hall, says he has grown used to the alarms and drones, but they sometimes keep him awake at night. Photograph: Andrei Popoviciu\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

The psychological toll is there, especially on children. In Ceatalchioi, Ecaterina Statache said her 11-year-old daughter had panic attacks prompted by the explosions. During the November evacuation, the girl was at school.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe cried the whole time during the evacuation,\u201d Statache said. \u201cLife is not normal here. But what can we do? We go on and hope that no one will die.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her 19-year-old son wants to stay, even as many of his friends have left to work abroad or moved to Tulcea. Older residents say they have little real choice.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt our age, where would we go?\u201d said Alexandru Nedelcu, a 70-year-old man living in Plauru with his wife. \u201cWe are not used to the city, but we can get used to the drones and bombs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following repeated incidents along its 400-mile border with Ukraine, Romania changed its legislation in 2025 to allow the military to shoot down unauthorised drones that enter its airspace. The army has so far refrained from doing so, wary of escalating tensions and being drawn directly into the war.<\/p>\n

Alexandru Nedelcu, who lives in Plauru, says people from the village are not used to the city so are reluctant to evacuate. Photograph: Andrei Popoviciu\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

In a recent television interview, Romania\u2019s president, Nicu\u015for Dan, said that reluctance to shoot down the drones was driven not by fear but by operational constraints.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf a drone is 500 metres from the Ukrainian border, depending on its trajectory, you can risk engaging it over Ukrainian territory,\u201d he said. \u201cBut if it is flying above a town, you cannot fire without risking civilians. If we can neutralise a drone without endangering residents or causing additional damage, you will see drones being shot down in Romania.\u201d<\/p>\n

For local officials, the problems are not only military ones. Cernega points to the lack of basic infrastructure in Plauru, including access to clean water, proper docking pontoons for boats and a road capable of supporting evacuations.<\/p>\n

That neglect has created resentment, including some anti-Ukrainian sentiment, as local people contrast the support offered to refugees with their own sense of abandonment.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe help the Ukrainians but we have been abandoned,\u201d said Cernega. \u201cIt would not cost much to fix the road, considering its strategic position on the border. The port across the river has fertiliser, fuel, everything that could make this a similar situation to what happened in Beirut,\u201d he said, referencing the explosion<\/a> that shook the Lebanese capital in 2020.<\/p>\n

As night falls over the delta, the Danube mirrors the lights of Izmail port. In Plauru, people close their shutters and wait. The war grinds on across the river, and for those living here, a single decision could make them the first Nato citizens drawn directly into it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At the edge of Romania\u2019s Danube delta on the border with Ukraine, in the village of Plauru, cows…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-665474","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115816311256821014","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}