Las Vegas woman bringing over 1K tourniquets to Ukraine
A Ukrainian woman who lives in Las Vegas is planning to deliver over 200 pounds of tourniquets to the war-torn country this weekend.
Alona Burns, with the help of her 16-year-old son Maximus Ambartsoumian, put out a call to their Las Vegas friends seeking donations of tourniquets and money to buy them. Within weeks, Burns said she collected 1,100 of them.
“I have somebody who I know and trust in Ukraine,” Burns said in an interview Thursday. “When I asked what should I bring, she told me bring tourniquets, all the rest you can buy in Europe. This you can’t buy. They are all sold out.”
Burns, who moved to Las Vegas in 2004 and opened Tough Mudder Bootcamp, said she has 13 family members who lived in Ukraine. Five left when war broke out and eight remain in Mykolaiv, a heavily bombed city just north of the Black Sea.
Burns plans to leave Las Vegas Saturday and fly to Warsaw, where she will exchange suitcases full of tourniquets with a friend who will finish the delivery. In Warsaw, Burns said she is picking up three families, totaling 10 people, that she will host in her home.
“It gives me fulfillment,” she said. “I am happy that I can do anything to save a life. What can be better than saving lives?”
She encouraged anyone willing to donate supplies to Ukraine to check the Facebook page Ukrainians in Las Vegas, or anyone willing to donate money to Venmo her @Alona_Burns.
Contact Sabrina Schnur at sschnur@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0278. Follow @sabrina_schnur on Twitter.
