Sleepy Ukrainian town finds itself on front line and under fire as Russian troops push advance in southeast

There is still, between bouts of artillery fire, a sleepy feel to the town of Orikhiv, nestled in among the wheat fields about 60 kilometres southeast of Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine. 

The buildings — at least those that have avoided being shelled — wear peeling paint and a faded charm. A daily market still clings to life, catering to an ever-shrinking number of residents and nearby farmers.  

There are fruit and vegetable stalls. There's someone selling fish and a few people offering butchered meat straight out of their car trunks.  

Ivan Vasilovich, 72, sells his own handmade brooms, saying he offers them to soldiers for free — so they can sweep the Russians away. 

He'll stay in Orikhiv, he insists, "until I'm dead."   

But there are few young people at the market aside from Ukrainian soldiers buying bags of vegetables. The emptiness of the roads leading to Orikhiv point to a front line now almost on top of the town, with Russian troops less than five kilometres away.  

Wedged between those troops and Ukrainian forces trying to push them back, Orikhiv can turn into a battleground in the few seconds it takes to register the sound of a missile whistling overhead, landing with an earth-shuddering crack a heartbeat later.  

 "Oh, shit," said social worker Valentina Los, clasping a hand to her mouth when she heard the first missile in a barrage last week.  

She was just setting out on her bicycle from the town's main administrative building to deliver food to vulnerable residents when it began. Some people can't leave for health reasons while others simply won't.  

"That's all," she said optimistically before the familiar whistle sliced through the air again, signalling another rocket.  

There are no air-raid sirens to warn residents and when missiles start to hit those caught on the street scatter in search of whatever cover they can find. Los wheeled her bike behind a tree at one point. 

"It's dangerous here," she said, starting to count the rockets.  

And so it goes. 

Many farmers in the surrounding area are no longer tending to their crops because of the danger. Fields next to the town are pockmarked by shelling. Natalia Omelchak, who runs a general store in a nearby village, says she sleeps in her clothes.