ATHENS, Ohio — When George Wood and his team of drivers left the United States on Independence Day, they were undertaking a patriotic act, he said: Driving trucks 1,500 miles from the United Kingdom to Ukraine. For the 10-person team, two weeks of hotels, border crossings, and meals on the road was worth it.
“[Ukrainians] know that people in this country, despite what maybe our government doesn’t do, are still here, and I think that’s that’s so important,” said Wood, of Amesville.
On Saturday, Aug. 1, Wood and his wife Marcia Burchby, as well as their group of eight other drivers, hosted at the Athens Community Center a presentation about their trip.
Wood expected around 10 people, but the room quickly filled with over 100 attendees, requiring more chairs to be brought out.
He and his team presented two videos detailing their experience travelling with trucks from the United Kingdom to Ukraine in collaboration with Car for Ukraine, an organization that provides vehicles to military units through donations. Ohio leads their 50 States for Ukraine campaign with $69,042 in donations, as of Aug. 3.
While the vehicles usually only last around a year, they save an estimated average of 20 lives each, according to Wood. The average cost of each vehicle is $12,500, which allowed the drivers to purchase five trucks for the Ukrainian army. Each of the 10 drivers had to pay for their own food, flights, and hotels, totaling between $2,000 and $3,000 per person, Wood said.
The team picked up the vehicles in the United Kingdom and boarded a ferry to the European mainland, then drove them to Ukraine. They wore t-shirts reading “Ohio Battalion.” In the video, Wood discussed feeling humbled by the resilience of the Ukrainian people.
“They had to live a normal life to prove to themselves, to the world, and to Putin that their lives are going on,” he said in the video.
While in Lviv, the team met up with Tetiana Mituhina, who lived in Athens for four months in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She and her family worked with the Athens County Sponsor Circle, a local group dedicated to helping refugees relocate to Athens County. She returned to Ukraine to serve in the army and is now the only female member of her 279-person unit, which has to provide its own food and shelter.
The drivers’ new fundraising goal is $20,000 for Mituhina’s unit, of which they have already raised $13,000. Attendees could donate at the event, but anyone can contribute a donation online.
“I think people need to know it doesn’t have to be a big thing,” Wood said. “You don’t have to go to Ukraine. You can put money up and help people send trucks. You can donate to charities that are supporting Ukraine. You can talk to your congressperson or senator and say, ‘Why aren’t we doing more?’ You can vote in ways that help Ukraine. They are on the front line of democracy and freedom.”
One sentiment Wood and his fellow drivers heard echoed by many Ukrainians was the fear of being forgotten by the United States.
Since the Russian invasion in 2022, the U.S. Congress has passed five bills contributing around $164 billion to the war. While that aid is still being dispersed, no new legislation has been passed since 2025.
Charitable donation scams, in which someone fraudulently claims to be collecting money for a good cause, have also made people wary of individually contributing to a cause. It’s created a challenge for Wood, who reaches out to people for support through email.
“When we sent this email out to all of you, several said, ‘Is this real? Is this a scam?’” he said, addressing the crowd.
While the team hasn’t finalized a decision yet, many of them hope to make another trip to Ukraine in February, around what will be the fifth anniversary of Russia’s invasion of the country. They continue to raise money for Mituhina and her unit and hope to contribute more vehicles.
When Wood and Burchby asked their son Michael about the trip, he was hesitant. His parents are in their 70s, and he wasn’t sure how safe it would be for them to make the trip, let alone in military trucks.
“I tried to find every reason not to, every excuse not to go, and it sort of just fell into place,” Michael Wood said. “And it was like, yeah, I have to do this.”
