400. Human Safari in Kherson & Drone Interceptors at Chernobyl

Battleground

Goalhanger

History

4.5 • 820 Ratings

🗓️ 17 May 2026

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this special edition of Battleground Ukraine, Saul David and Patrick Bishop catch up with friend of the show - intrepid Hungarian war reporter Boldi Gyori, who has just returned from the front lines and the deeply scarred landscapes of Ukraine. Boldi paints a vivid, surreal, and at times dystopian picture of a conflict that has evolved into a "forever war" for those living through it. The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone Today: Forty years after the nuclear catastrophe, Boldi explores a lush but heavily militarised zone where thousands of workers and soldiers monitor radiation and guard against a repeat of the 2022 Russian invasion. He shares a chilling look inside a Pripyat hospital basement where the clothing of the original first responders remains too radioactive to touch. The "Human Safari" of Kherson: A brutal look at a besieged city where Russian FPV drones explicitly target civilians on the street. Boldi details how locals use Telegram channels to duck from shadow to shadow, how a brave Hungarian volunteer smuggles in life-saving baby formula, and why thousands of citizens simply cannot afford to leave. The Tech Battleground: An inside look at the high-tech, 3D-printed interceptor drones deployed by Ukrainians from ordinary minivans to knock out Russian Shahed and Molniya drones mid-air with an astonishing 85–90% success rate. A Shift in Budapest: Following a major election victory in Hungary, Boldi breaks down why the Kremlin has stopped pulling its punches in the western region of Transcarpathia—and how Hungary's new government is finally pushing back against Russian aggression. Join the Conversation: If you have a question about the war in Ukraine or any of the conflicts we cover, email us at podbattleground@gmail.com Follow us on: X - @PodBattleground Instagram - podbattleground TikTok - battlegroundukraine Producer: James Hodgson A Goalhanger Podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to this special edition of Battleground Ukraine with me Saul David and Patrick Bishop.
0:18.0	Well, today we're speaking to friend of the podcast and
0:21.3	intrepid Hungarian war reporter, Baldi Giori, who's actually currently in Budapest,
0:26.7	but he's just come back from a trip to both Chernobyl and also Heson. And we spoke to him
0:32.1	about that. Hi, great to see you guys again after our trip in Ukraine.
0:37.8	I don't know if you ever get the chance to listen to the podcast, Baldy, but we're still playing out the various episodes.
0:43.2	So your voice is actually front and center of the podcast at the moment.
0:47.1	Oh, great. I'm fighting my narcissistic traits not to listen back myself all the time in your podcast, but I do give it a glimpse once in a while.
0:55.6	There's a wonderful interview at the moment. The second part has just come out on Wednesday with
0:58.9	Katia. So give that a listen if you can, because as you remember, we all just sat there
1:04.3	awestruck as she spoke to us about her time on the front line, particularly in Abdivka,
1:13.0	which is the subject of the second episode.
1:18.3	Yeah, that was a great interview, I think. And she's a lovely lady and the fierce warrior as well. Yeah, which is the contrast that struck us all as so unusual. But let's get back to
1:23.4	current events, Boldie. Since we left, obviously obviously a little bit of waters under the bridge,
1:28.6	particularly developments in Hungary. And we'll come on to that in a moment because there have
1:32.8	been some interesting moves, I suppose, by the Russians to target the ethnic minority element
1:38.8	of Ukraine. We'll come on to that. But tell us a little bit about what you've been up to recently.
1:44.0	Yeah. So as listeners probably remember, I've spent election month in Hungary because of the
1:50.2	high stakes and because of work-related issues as well. But around three weeks ago, I went back to
1:56.9	Ukraine and I've been to the Chernobyl exclusion zone.
2:01.8	I was able to visit a Ukrainian drone unit working with actually I think high-tech technology
2:09.0	at a cutting-edge technology intercepting Russian drones with their own drones.
	...

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