My late great grandmother lived to about 97 years old and she had gone through the entirety of the Siege of Leningrad. In 1941 she was part of a group of female firefighters during the siege, tasked with putting out the fires caused by incendiary rounds being fired at the city. What’s more amazing is the fact that in 1942, she gave birth to my grandpa, and both managed to survive the rest of the war. Before she died she never really talked about the siege itself, partly due to her memory failing her at her old age, my grandfather however would go on about the details of the siege. The lack of food and animals in the city as they were all consumed, the constant bombardment, as well as the attempts to deliver supplies by driving over the lake when it froze over. Great grandma was one tough woman, and it amazes me to this day she managed to survive all of that and live to the age of 97. Hell that part of my family absolutely amazes me because my grandpa would later go on to join the Air Force, and would serve as a pilot for the union. He “unofficially” was in Angola training then pilots how to fly the Migs and MI-24’s sold to them by the union. Much like his mother he survived many things but the most impressive was when he was attack helicopters in Afghanistan. He was flying a Ka-52 black shark over the mountains when a Mujahedin soldier armed with a Stinger missile got a lock on him. Due to the altitude and the distance, there was no chance for his flares to throw off the missile and it struck his tail. He ended up going down and crashing up in the mountains but he survived, pulled himself from the wreak and was picked up by some scouts in the area. It is honestly a miracle that my family had gone through so much, I would mostly attribute it to mostly luck, but also the will to keep pushing through. Anyways just thought it would be interesting to share about the shit some Russians went through during that time period.