Ukraine: Hull volunteers take sensory equipment to help orphans

The sensory room features soft surfaces and lighting

Volunteers from Hull have kept a promise to return to a Polish orphanage to help more than 60 disabled children who were evacuated from Ukraine.

Fundraiser Lee Ellerker made the pledge when he visited the orphanage in the northern city of Torun in June.

At the time he highlighted a need for sensory equipment which had been left behind when the children left Ukraine.

After a fundraising effort, volunteers have now installed a special sensory room with soft flooring and lighting.

Mr Ellerker said the children were delighted and the donation had "changed their lives".

The equipment was among more than £10,000 worth of aid which filled two vans driven to Poland by the Hull volunteers.

As well as the special room the team from Hull also delivered medical equipment, clothing and food.

Lee Ellerker first visited the orphanage in June

Mr Ellerker said the sensory equipment was vital to help the children's development.

"It's a really good bit of kit we've installed there," he said. "Anything to do with sense, touch, feel, aromatherapy.

"It was brilliant to just see the laughs on their faces and smiling and giggling, from what they did have in the first place to that."

He said their original orphanage in Kharkiv in north-east Ukraine had been destroyed in the war "so they will not be going back to Ukraine, they'll be staying here in Poland".