Dmytro Siryk, the radio presenter and defender of Ukraine, was killed in a battle near Avdiivka on April 20, 2023.
Dmytro was born in Severodonetsk in the Luhansk region. Since 2011, he has worked as a DJ at the local radio Pulse in Luhansk. He was known to his audience under the pseudonym Ivan Lopata.
2014, when the Russian troops invaded Donbas, marked Dmytro’s first encounter with the war. As soon as radio broadcast was restored in the liberated Luhansk region, Siryk was one of the first employees to have returned to the Pulse, in his hometown of Severodonetsk this time. Since then, Dmytro has worked as a music editor and radio presenter.
“He was a very supportive and responsible colleague. We could hardly ever hear a “no” from him. He could work at night or on the weekend if that was required. Everyone could attest to how reliable he was,” says Siryk’s colleague Victoria Marchenko.
Dmytro created his original author’s project “Rewind” to get the audience acquainted with new music and hit songs. He was fond of Ukrainian music and popularized it among people. Moreover, his colleagues recall, that Dmytro had taught them much of work with a microphone, sound engineering, and stress resistance on air.
Victoria Marchenko remembers the moments of Dmytro’s engagement in producing the news. He was as versatile in a profession as he was in life.
“Our colleagues from other departments often considered him too stern, but we who had known him well, understood that it was merely an appearance,” says Victoria with a smile. “Dmytro was incredibly kind-hearted and had a cool sense of humor. No time with him was ever boring.”
After the very beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Dmytro took his family to Ivano-Frankivsk. In March 2022, he stood up to defend Ukraine.
Siryk performed combat missions in the Kharkiv and Donetsk regions. He had a dream of returning to his hometown and working in his radio studio in Luhansk.
Dmytro Siryk was 36 years old. He had parents, a fiancée, and a son.
