«Carry the coffin longer, so there will be more honors.» How those killed in the war in Ukraine are buried in Moscow

The first part of the journalist’s experiment diaries can be read here.

01/30/2026

My first SMO funeral is planned for Domodedovo Cemetery, but the body must be picked up at Nikolo-Arkhangelskoye – that’s where the body storage is. It’s used to keep bodies longer than in regular morgues – it has more powerful freezers. “Cargo 200” often arrives at these storages, as well as unidentified or unclaimed bodies. There are six such storages in Moscow.

Our team meets at 8:30 at Novokosino station. There’s an information stand near the wall before the turnstiles, where you can get info about contract military service.

Kolya arrived earlier than anyone, and while we’re standing together, he jokes with me about the specifics of military funerals:

“It’s almost like a regular funeral, except I’ll have more trouble, running back and forth, while you’ll be standing aside and laughing at me. Just make sure the relatives don’t notice you laughing.”

At the end, Kolya adds that the coffin must be carried on the shoulders – that’s the honor for the military, and that tips at military funerals are very rare. “Of course, I got tips the last three times, but I was very lucky,” he immediately explains. Kolya has been working in the escort team for nine months already – without days off, and on top of his main job. He became the foreman in his very first month.

Soon Vlad – a fan of dark humor who’s been escorting funerals since August and wants to become a funeral agent – and quiet Timofey join us. While we’re waiting for the bus to the cemetery, he stays silent – saving his energy.

The body storage is supposed to open at 9 a.m., but the staff is late. Finally, the worker opens the sliding gates for us. Behind them, under a canopy in front of the warehouse, there are empty zinc coffins and various trash.

We carry the empty coffin from the hearse into the storage and lay it on the floor. The worker moves the coffin to make it easier to transfer the body, takes all the deceased’s documents, and goes to the next room, where open zinc coffins are on the shelves. The staff takes one and sets it next to the burial coffin, to transfer the body bag from the zinc coffin.

The body is in a funeral polyethylene bag – a pathological bag. It’s supposed to contain the deceased’s biological fluids and block the smell. According to other funeral workers, the bag doesn’t always work as intended. But at least you can’t see the mutilated body through the black plastic.

This time, the body is intact. The bag is slightly open, and you can see a bit of the deceased’s face. We cover it with a blanket and take the coffin to the car. There, foreman Kolya hands me a rolled-up black plastic ribbon with the inscription “To the Defender of the Fatherland from the Ministry of Defense.”

“This is a souvenir for you. These are standard ribbons that are given out. We don’t use them, sometimes we keep them for ourselves,” he says.

Besides the ribbon, the Ministry of Defense gives a wreath to the fallen serviceman.

While we’re driving, Vlad puts on his headphones and falls asleep, and Timofey and Kolya discuss work, our deceased, and then the war. They don’t openly condemn the SMO, but from the context of their conversation, it’s clear they have a negative attitude about what’s happening.

“They never saw that kind of money in their lives, and never will!” one of them says about the dead Russian soldiers. The funeral team talks with regret about people who have no other way to solve their financial problems except to sign up for the war.

We arrive at the old cemetery by the church – the funeral service will be held there. Near the church, the priest is clearing the road of snow. On the way to the church, we try carrying the coffin on our shoulders. Inside, we place the coffin on stands, put the cap and portrait at the head, and the Russian flag at the feet. The loose parts of the flag are tucked inside the coffin.

The relatives finish the paperwork. By the hearse, the client is talking to the foreman, and a big guy is holding an open bottle of Jägermeister. All the relatives go to the church with the foreman. The three of us enter at the end of the service and stand in the corner with the foreman. The relatives start approaching the coffin to say goodbye. Two women sit on a bench by the entrance and begin to sob heavily.

After the funeral service, the priest adds a few words of his own, talks about soldiers dying in the field, about desk-bound officers, and how everything is different for them after death. He ends by saying how important it is for society to unite for victory in the war.

We take the coffin back to the hearse to go to the new cemetery for the burial. While we wait to leave, I discuss the service with Andrey:

“Do priests often say things like that after the funeral service?”

“It depends. Some like to talk for a long time; they try to help people cope with loss. But it’s strange that this one was campaigning for the war.”

The hearse stops at a small area with a table and a tent. Under the tent are soldiers in an honor guard – three are very young, the fourth, an officer, much older. When we unload the coffin onto the table, the relatives ask the foreman to open the lid to put special items in – an Iron Maiden vinyl, cognac, cigarettes, toothpaste, a toothbrush. The foreman is already closing the coffin, but then the big guy, tipsy from Jägermeister, asks him to lift the blanket and show the mother her son’s face.

“It’s better not to,” the foreman asks.

“I’m old enough, I’ll survive,” the mother replies.

The foreman obeys and turns back the blanket. The woman silently looks at her son’s dead face – intact, only half red.

“And you said it was a nightmare, that everything was terrible,” the tipsy relative says, blushing himself.

“I didn’t say it like that, but okay,” the foreman replies.

All preparations are finished, and the funeral procession begins. The soldiers pull the flag from the coffin, fold it, and give it to the relatives. The senior soldier hands over the cap, the medal pillow, and the chest. We carry the coffin onto the road, hoist it onto our shoulders, and on the command “Left!” march about 100 meters to the grave. After the gravediggers lower the coffin into the pit, three volleys are fired into the sky.

After saying goodbye to the relatives, the foreman gestures to us that there will be no tips today.

01/31/2026

The hearse driver is almost half an hour late – a little more and he could have been fined. While we wait, one of the porters, Ilya, suggests warming up with alcohol. Today it’s cold.

Finally, the hearse arrives and we go for the body. Our deceased is light, in a sealed bag – probably missing some body parts. We cover the coffin with a flag, quickly move it to the hearse, and head to Domodedovo Cemetery. The service will be held by the graves. Porter Andrey is surprised by the number of flags and starts filming them on his phone.

“I don’t know if there’s a camera here, or if I’m allowed to film the flags. I don’t care. If I get fired for this, I’ll only be glad,” he says.

The hearse stops by the tent, the team gets out and starts preparing the wreaths – attaching ribbons to them. They’re better quality than those from the Ministry of Defense – wide, with inscriptions like “From wife to husband.” You have to fold the ribbon in half, slip the loop under one of the frame’s wires, and thread the loose ends through the loop. I don’t have gloves, and with each wreath it takes longer – my fingers are freezing.

The priest arrives and asks the team for the deceased’s name. Then he approaches the soldier’s wife and asks her, “Mobilized or contract?” When he hears “contract,” he replies curtly, “Good.” The wife asks to see the body, but the foreman and priest talk her out of it.

“Feet got cold?” the priest asks me. “Try self-heating insoles. I bought them for pennies at Sportmaster, and now my feet are warm, even though they’re big. It’s cold today, I’ve got a few more services. I’ll definitely need some vodka.”

“Good tip! I’m already warming up!” Ilya says to the priest, showing him his flask.

The priest complains that the cemetery management didn’t assign more people for today. There’s a line of cars forming on the road. Today, 12 SMO participants are being buried here.

Finally, it’s time to carry the coffin. The priest leads the procession with incense and sings the funeral prayer. Later, the foreman tells me that at the end of SMO funerals, you can’t ask the client for a “thank you.” But today we got a tip – 10,000 for five people.

By funeral workers’ standards, this is a good, respectful funeral. And adisrespectful funeral, according to one of them, “is when it’s obvious the person went for the money, died, and his wife gets the death payout, no one cares, and the wife already found a replacement. Only the mother is to be pitied.”

“It’s all very sad, a lot of possibly good young Russian guys are dying, and our gene pool is shrinking a lot, really a lot,” he adds.

02/06/2026

Today’s funeral takes place at Yastrebkovskoe Cemetery. The body storage is the same as last time. Foreman Stepan, it turns out, has already been waiting by the storage for an hour. The bus doesn’t show up, so one of the porters calls a taxi to avoid being late. At the meeting point, Stepan silently hands out armbands and badges, we take a photo for the report and get on the bus.

“Serves you right, you damn millionaire,” mutters a porter about 60, nicknamed Behemoth, looking at the coffin. “And he stinks, too.”

I don’t smell anything. Because the bus is speeding up and braking, we have to hold the coffin extra to keep it steady – it’s not wrapped very neatly with the Russian flag.

At the cemetery, while we wait for the paperwork, Behemoth tells a bit about his life. He tried many jobs, from chemist to furniture store manager, and before the “big war” he traded on the stock exchange. Now, because of sanctions, “everything’s blocked,” and the former trader works in the funeral escort team. But today is his second-to-last shift: he quarreled with the contractor and is quitting.

We arrive at the cemetery and stop far from the tent where the service will be held. The second porter suggests to Stepan that they carry the coffin from here, “so there will be more honors,” but Stepan doesn’t react to the joke. We unload the coffin, put it on the table under the tent, and discuss with the gravediggers which path to take so the ground for digging won’t freeze. Stepping on the snow packs it down and removes insulation in some spots – the diggers don’t want that.

Finally, the relatives arrive. They gather around the tent, and soon the service begins. There are about 30 people, filling the whole road, standing in several rows, and the coffin isn’t visible behind them. At the end, the priest calls the relatives to say goodbye to the soldier. The last to say goodbye is the deceased’s father. He puts his hand on the coffin, moves his lips, sheds a tear, and steps away. The team surrounds the coffin, lifts it, leaves the tent, puts the coffin on their shoulders, and walks ahead with the priest for 10 meters, then hands it to the gravediggers – and they walk their 10 meters to the grave. All the relatives follow to commit the deceased to the earth. One of the gravediggers holds a shovel with earth, and the relatives each take a handful and throw it on the coffin.

While the coffin is being buried, my colleagues discuss SMO funerals. Our contractor started assigning them these orders in September 2025. But in general, almost all contractors for the State Ritual Service have SMO funerals.

“What stuck with me in the ritual is that some soldiers and warrant officers don’t know what to do and ask us. For example, some don’t know how to fold the flag properly, how to hand it over to the relatives. And that shows that sometimes no one cares about these honors,” says one of the funeral workers.