Ukraine Trident Ascending

Kyiv, Ukraine.  May 31, 2015.  I was looking out my hotel window onto the Maidan (Independence Square) the scene of the Orange Revolution in 2004, and last year's revolution.

What I saw was a group of 20 or 30 people moving down the street supporting a bunch of blue and yellow balloons. Blue and yellow are the vivid bright colors of the Ukrainian flag.

When you travel by train from Lviv to Kyiv as I had a few days before you get to see, across the immense flat terrain, vast yellow fields of grain stretching to the horizon under a comparably big blue sky.

The blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag give prominent, appropriate and proud recognition to these colors which accompany Ukraine's unique geography, position and important contribution as "The Breadbasket of Europe". Yes Ukraine does matter and not just to Ukrainians!

Not knowing the purpose of this balloon procession, I left my room and hastened down to Maidan Square to see what this was all about. I then saw that they were bringing the balloons to the center  of the square, having, I believed, failed to launch them into the sky.

This was not about just a bunch of balloons. The balloons were being assembled in the shape of the Ukrainian Trident. The Trident is Ukrainian's coat of arms. An important  symbol of its unique identity as a country and culture.

You see the trident  on clothes, shirts and hats, posters. Everywhere.  And importantly in the pattern of the candles laid out on the surface of Maidan Square to commemorate the fallen heroes. The Heavenly Hundred I discussed in a previous post.

So what I was hoping for, and hoping real hard, was that they would be able to launch this Trident successfully. That it would soar into the sky and be a hopeful sign of what was to come for Ukraine. I am sure that my hope was shared by the crowd which gathered and grew as we all waited patiently and with intense attention.

It did not concern me that they were having difficulty in launching the Trident as long as they were ultimately able to achieve liftoff.  For me the difficulties signified the reality of Ukraine's struggle for independence and that it was and will not be easy.

And indeed there were obstacles to this launch. First the challenge to balance the balloons in such a manner that the ones on top filled with helium were sufficient to provide liftoff while the ones on the bottom filled with air  were of sufficient mass to hold down  the base of the structure.

Properly done the Trident would stand erect and also face, not sideways, but directly towards the crowd as it rose into the sky. Thinking about this later I better understood the failure of the first attempt that I had witnessed from my hotel room and the long delay in getting the structure positioned and balanced just right. This was not an easy task to accomplish.

After quite a long wait a man came across the square holding a bunch more of yellow gas filled balloons. These were then attached, somewhat painstakingly where I assumed they would provide lift off, if all went well.


And then gradually the ropes tying down the balloon assembly were loosened and ever so slowly the structure began to assume the shape of the Trident.

After a bit more time the ropes were completely released and the Trident began to rise but very very slowly.

As the Trident rose it became apparent that  a breeze  was pushing the structure towards Maidan Square's 200 foot high Independence Monument. Uh oh.


I certainly did not want to see it collide with the monument.

Then it occurred to me that even if it did successfully pass by the the Monument it had to get past the massive Ukraine Hotel directly in the path it was moving.

So what happened?  Click on the Video below.