Escaping 'hell on earth': 17-year-old Ukrainian on her last days in bombarded city of Mariupol

Yulia Karpenko is a 17-year-old Mariupol resident who fled the city with her parents on March 15. Cut off from the world with no water, electricity or connection, not knowing whether they would live or die. She tells ITV News about escaping what she describes as a living hell.

"We escaped hell on earth", 17 year old Yulia tells us as she and her family are finally on the road out of their home city of Mariupol. 

The besieged port city in the south east, her home for 17 years, has been pounded by artillery and is all but gone, she says matter-of-factly.

For more than two weeks Yulia and her family have been trapped in Mariupol as the relentless artillery shelling annihilated her city, her home and her people. 

"All the time I was crying, I couldn't calm down", Yulia recalls. "The emotion we felt most was fear. We couldn't leave and we struggled to get help as we were being bombed."

Drone footage captured shelling in the besieged city of Mariupol

Not knowing whether they would live or die, Yulia recalls the horror of being incarcerated in a war zone, trying to stay alive and avoid the bombs. 

"It was so loud that I couldn't hear and felt dazed."

Yulia relives the moment over and over again as the memories continue to haunt her. 

She watched in horror, helpless as her city burned down around her.

"We were so scared of bombs falling. A shop near my house was bombed, it caused holes in the walls. Doors were broken in half. It was hard to breathe."

Yulia says she is still in shock and panics every time she hears a loud noise.

Terrified and trapped, Yulia and her family couldn't get out. 

"Electricity, heating, running water, all gone.

"We had to cook in the yard, in front of the house, on fire like cavemen. It's hard to cook food when you're being bombed. You have to constantly listen."

With no mobile signal or internet connection they were left isolated with no way of receiving vital information about any green corridors opening. 

Yulia and her family spent hours agonising whether to risk leaving or to stay and trying to persuade her grandparents to leave with them.

"They're defiant", she says. "Despite everything they refuse to leave their home and their country."

After noticing a few cars had left, her family made the decision to leave. Her grandparents have stayed to await their fate.

"I lived in our flat for 15 years, it's the only home I remember.

"It's gone, I don't have a flat anymore. It has burned."

Yulia and her parents packed a few things and left in their car in the private convoy on March 15.

She says she feel safer now she is away from Mariupol.

"I definitely feel safer. In Mariupol it was a living nightmare. But I don't think I can ever feel safe in Ukraine."

Her dream is to be an English teacher but she says she can't think about her future right now, she says it's about surviving.

"I don't want to leave my grandparents, I don't want to leave my home, my country but I have no choice."

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