After more than a thousand of its workers went to fight Russia's invasion, a coal mine in eastern Ukraine needed workers. Its answer was to permit women to work underground for the first time in its history.
在一千多名工人前往抗击俄罗斯入侵后，乌克兰东部的一座煤矿急需工人。它的解决办法就是历史上第一次允许女性在地下工作。
Over a hundred accepted the offer.
超过一百人接受了这份工作。
"I took this job because the war started and there were no other jobs," 22-year-old Krystyna said. The mine's officials asked Reuters not to give the last names of those who talked to the news service.
22岁的克雷斯蒂娜说：“我接受这份工作是因为战争开始了，没有其他工作可做。”该矿官员要求路透社不要透露接受采访人员的姓氏。
For five months, Krystyna has worked as a technician 470 meters below ground. She works on the small electric trains that move workers more than four kilometers down the mine.
克雷斯蒂娜在地下470米的地方做了五个月的技术员。她在小型电动火车上工作，这些火车将工人运送到井下四公里多的地方。
She agreed to take the job after overcoming her fear of leaving her four-year-old son, Denys, at home with her mother. Her hometown of Pavlohrad is 100 kilometers from the front but it is often hit by Russian missiles.
在克服了把四岁的儿子丹尼斯留在家里和母亲在一起的恐惧后，她同意接受这份工作。她的家乡帕夫洛赫拉德距离前线100公里，但经常被俄罗斯导弹击中。
The work is interesting but difficult, she said. The equipment is heavy and the steam is not easy to deal with. But the pay is good and she feels a sense of duty to stay and do her part for those who have gone to fight.
她说，这项工作有趣而艰难。设备很重，蒸汽不容易处理。但薪水很高，她觉得有责任留下来，为那些去战斗的人尽自己的一份力量。
Her older brother worked in the same mine. He joined the army two weeks after the start of the invasion, Krystyna said. She added she worries greatly about him.
她的哥哥在同一个矿井工作。克雷斯蒂娜说，他在入侵开始两周后参军。她补充说，她非常担心他。
She said, "Our boys were taken to the front, and now we need to support them: there is no one else to work in the mine now."
她说：“我们的小伙子们被带到了前线，现在我们需要支持他们：现在没有其他人在矿井里工作了。”
Ukraine's coal industry was once one of the largest in Europe. It has suffered many years of decline since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The government-controlled market which it supplied suddenly was not there.
乌克兰的煤炭工业曾经是欧洲最大的工业之一。自苏联解体以来，它经历了多年的衰落。由它供应的政府管制市场突然不存在了。
Russia-backed militias in eastern Ukraine took over many coal-rich areas in 2014. After the 2022 invasion, Russia occupied even more mines.
2014年，俄罗斯支持的乌克兰东部民兵占领了许多煤炭丰富的地区。2022年入侵后，俄罗斯占领了更多的煤矿。
DTEK is the mine's owner and Ukraine's largest private energy company. It says nearly 3,000 of its 20,000 mineworkers are fighting.
顿巴斯煤炭能源有限公司是该矿的所有者，也是乌克兰最大的私营能源公司。该公司表示，其20000名矿工中有近3000人正在战斗。
Of the thousand miners at this mine and its nearby other mine who went to fight, 42 have been killed.
在这座矿井和附近另一座矿井的数千名矿工中，有42人被杀。
Although some women worked in the mines before the war, they were barred from doing jobs underground by the government. The work was considered too physically demanding. The policy had been in place since the Soviet times.
尽管一些妇女战前就在矿场工作，但政府禁止她们在地下工作。人们认为这项工作对体力要求太高。这项政策从苏联时代就开始实行了。
The ban was removed during the war. Now, about 400 women work underground at DTEK's mines. That is only 2.5 percent of the underground workforce.
这项禁令在战争期间被取消了。现在，大约有400名妇女在顿巴斯煤炭能源有限公司的矿井地下工作。这只占地下劳动力的2.5%。
"We do everything on the same level as the men – unless it's something very heavy that we can't lift," 43-year-old Natalia said. She also works as a technician who looks after the trains.
43岁的纳塔利娅说：“我们做任何事情都和男人们在同一水平上——除非是我们抬不起来的重物。”她还是一名技术员，负责照管火车。
Natalia used to work in a shop selling electronics until she lost that job when Ukrainian businesses closed their doors at the beginning of the invasion. When she decided to work in the mine, her 19-year-old son had already worked in a neighboring mine for a year.
纳塔利娅曾在一家销售电子产品的商店工作，直到入侵开始时乌克兰企业关门，她才失去了这份工作。当她决定去矿井工作时，她19岁的儿子已经在附近的一个矿井工作了一年。
"Actually I had been convincing him not to go and work there," she remembered. But she said she was now happily working in the mine and planned to stay, even after the war.
“事实上，我一直在说服他不要去那里工作，”她回忆道。但她说，她现在很高兴在矿井里工作，并计划留下来，即使在战争结束后。
I'm Gregory Stachel.
我是格雷戈里·施塔赫尔。(51VOA.COM原创翻译，请勿转载，违者必究！)