A 12-year-old Ukrainian boy has emerged as an unlikely war hero after reportedly stopping a Russian fibre-optic drone that was heading towards children playing near his home in Ukraine’s Chernihiv region, close to the Russian border.
According to a report by The Washington Post, the boy, identified as Anatolii Prokhorenko, used a technique taught to him by a Ukrainian soldier to disable the drone mid-flight by snapping its fibre-optic control cable.
The incident took place in a small farming village located around seven miles from the Russian border. Anatolii was trimming a damaged branch from a pear tree for a neighbour when he heard the now-familiar buzzing sound of a drone overhead.
The region has witnessed repeated drone strikes in recent months. A drone had reportedly destroyed a car near a local shop in March, while another exploded on the same street just a day before the latest incident.
Drone Was Moving Towards Children
Anatolii noticed the black quadcopter flying low towards a group of buildings where several children, including three of his younger siblings, were playing outside.
Speaking to The Washington Post, the boy recalled realising that the drone was preparing for an attack after it began gaining altitude near the children.
“It saw the children and started gaining altitude. That’s when I realised something was about to happen,” he said.
Instead of running for cover, Anatolii remembered a lesson he had learnt months earlier from a Ukrainian soldier known by the call sign “Dynamo”.
Soldier Taught Him How To Snap Drone Cable
Months before the incident, Anatolii and his father had met the soldier while cutting firewood in a forest. Curious about the thin threads the soldier was handling, the boy asked questions and learnt that the material was fibre-optic filament used in advanced drones.
The soldier reportedly demonstrated several ways to snap the nearly invisible cable and advised him to wait at least 15 seconds after a drone passed before attempting anything, ensuring the drone operator could no longer track him visually.
When the drone approached his village, Anatolii quickly searched for the glinting cable trailing behind it.
He jumped from the tree, ran towards the drone’s path and grabbed the hair-thin fibre-optic tether. Recalling the soldier’s instructions, he looped and pulled the line before snapping it.
“I didn’t have time. So I counted to 10, and I broke it,” Anatolii said.
The drone reportedly lost control, veered away from the houses and later crashed into a swampy area nearby.
Soldier Calls Boy’s Reaction Extraordinary
The soldier known as Dynamo later praised the child’s quick thinking, saying even trained soldiers might struggle to react so quickly under pressure.
“Not every soldier would have been able to react in a split second like that. How can a civilian person, especially a child, do something like that?” he told The Washington Post.
Rise Of Fibre-Optic Drones In Russia-Ukraine War
The report also highlighted the increasing use of fibre-optic drones in the Russia-Ukraine war.
Unlike standard first-person view (FPV) drones that rely on radio signals and can often be jammed electronically, fibre-optic drones are connected to operators through ultra-thin cables that can stretch for miles. Because they do not rely on radio frequencies, they are far more resistant to electronic warfare systems.
According to a United Nations human rights report cited by the publication, attacks involving such drones have sharply increased in recent months, with civilians frequently becoming targets.
Family Relocated After Online Threats
While Anatolii was widely celebrated in Ukraine following the incident, the report said he also became the subject of threats on Russian Telegram channels.
His family, which includes seven members, has since relocated to a borrowed two-room apartment in the city of Chernihiv for safety reasons.
The story has drawn attention internationally as a stark example of how deeply the war has affected civilian life in border regions of Ukraine, where even children are learning survival techniques usually associated with the battlefield.