Odesa residents brace for fight: "I can sacrifice anything. Even my life."
Russian forces are making inroads across the entire Black Sea coastline, and Ukrainian President Volodmyr Zelensky warns an attack on Odesa is imminent. Residents in Odesa face the choice of their lives: flee or stay and fight.
"We have no gas, we are freezing," said resident Tetiana Nikolenko. "Bodies are being buried in the yards of the apartment blocks. We can't live like this!"
The Kremlin is targeting Ukraine's coastal strongholds. Mariupol is the latest city to see shelling by Russia on humanitarian corridors meant for thousands to flee the city. The people who survive are forced to bury those who were killed, some even in mass graves. Local officials say more than 1,200 have been killed in Mariupol alone.
Russian forces first took the city of Kherson, though not without resistance from protesters. On Thursday, they targeted Mykolayiv as they make their way towards the crown jewel of the Black Sea: Odesa.
If Odesa is lost, Ukraine will lose its last port and vital supply lines. It would also mean that Russian President Vladimir Putin would dominate the northern half of the Black Sea, putting pressure on the nearby NATO allies of Bulgaria and Romania.
Putin called the city out by name in his declaration of war, and its residents have been bracing for a fight ever since. Men and women who have chosen to stay in the city are filling more than 10,000 sandbags a day.
"I can sacrifice anything, even my life, just to save the people behind me," air traffic controller turned volunteer Dmitro Boris told CBS News.