KHERSON OBLAST, Ukraine — Tampa-based nonprofit Project DYNAMO, which has made headlines for its rescue efforts in Ukraine and Afghanistan, has successfully saved a 27-year-old American citizen and his family from Russian captivity, a spokesperson announced Tuesday.
Michigan native Kirillo Alexandrov had been living with his Ukrainian wife and mother-in-law in a small town near Kherson, Ukraine, when Russian forces invaded.
“In late March, while Alexandrov was attempting to evacuate with his family, Russian forces arrested him and fabricated nearly a dozen criminal charges against him centered on espionage and other charges related to allegedly spying for the U.S. government,” Project DYNAMO explained in a statement. “Since then, Russian forces have interrogated and detained Alexandrov as a hostage for more than a month, with the intention of sending him to Moscow.”
Alexandrov’s mom contacted the nonprofit, which alerted the U.S. government. From there, Project DYNAMO says it began planning the “highly complex and dangerous rescue” that relied on a network of contacts in Russia and Ukraine.
Project DYNAMO said its team negotiated with Alexandrov’s captors for more than a month before conversations stalled. When Project DYNAMO realized he was about to be moved to Moscow where he could have been imprisoned for decades, the nonprofit initiated a special operation to get him back.
At the time, Alexandrov was being held more than 62 miles behind the front lines of the fight for Ukraine. He was in a Russia-controlled region surrounded by land minds, troops, tanks and artillery. Once Project DYNAMO got him out of the Russians’ hands, the evacuation team loaded him and his family up and began the 10-15-hour journey through the active war zone in Ukraine and toward the border with Poland.
“The Project DYNAMO team continues to accomplish the impossible - on the ground in conflict zones using their guile, expertise and deep knowledge of the international security and intelligence environment,” Project DYNAMO spokesperson James Judge wrote in an email. “From landing the first charter aircraft in Kabul under Taliban rule and executing the first large-scale, private rescue of Americans there, to now, rescuing an American and his family from captivity for alleged espionage in Russian-occupied Ukraine.”
American combat veteran Bryan Stern, who co-founded Project DYNAMO and led Alexandrov’s rescue mission, said more than a dozen team members were spread out across four countries developing various ways out.
“Nothing was off the table and countless hours were spent navigating the murky world of international security services and diplomacy between two countries at war, all with a young American in the middle. We knew we had to do everything possible to get him out of captivity before he was illegally moved to Moscow,” Stern wrote in a statement. “The bottom line is that our team stepped up, we got creative, and we never gave up on this young American or his family.”
Stern added, “This is a win for this family and America and a strong reminder to Russia that we will not leave our people behind.”
The rescue mission was dubbed DETROIT LIONS because Alexandrov was from Michigan. While this was Project DYNAMO’s first rescue of an American captive in Ukraine, the nonprofit has saved more than 600 people from the war zone across over 50 missions in recent months.
Judge pointed to DYNAMO’s successful rescues of babies, senior citizens and people with disabilities as more examples of its work to protect vulnerable populations amid global conflicts.
“Project DYNAMO’s unconventional approach to rescue operations continues to succeed where traditional efforts might not,” Judge added.
Anyone in need of evacuation is urged to register at projectdynamo.org and register for the U.S. State Department's STEP Program.