Surgeons remove unexploded grenade lodged in Ukrainian soldier's chest

Sappers neutralised the explosive that was lodged just beneath the young man’s heart, Kyiv said



An X-ray said to show an unexploded grenade wedged inside the chest of a Ukrainian soldier. Photograph:
Samantha Lock
@Samantha__Lock
Thu 12 Jan 2023 02.20 EST

A Ukrainian soldier has had successful surgery to remove an unexploded grenade from his chest, senior officials in Kyiv have said.

Surgeons removed the weapon from just beneath the heart of the injured serviceman, while two sappers ensured the operation was conducted safely, said Hanna Maliar, Ukraine’s deputy minister of defence, who uploaded an image apparently showing an X-ray of the ordnance inside the soldier’s body.

“Military doctors conducted an operation to remove a VOG grenade, which did not break, from the body of the soldier,” she wrote in a Facebook post.

Anton Gerashchenko, Ukraine’s internal affairs ministerial adviser, said the team of sappers neutralised the munition, and described the procedure as one that would “go down in medical textbooks”.

The operation was carried out without using electrocoagulation — a common method to control bleeding during surgery — because “the grenade could detonate at any moment”, Maliar said.

More:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/12/surgeons-remove-unexploded-grenade-lodged-in-ukrainian-soldiers-chest