LUKE AIR FORCE BASE, Ariz. -- As Mykhailo Khromiak walked alone along the beach shore, his steps sank into the cool, damp sand before being washed away by the gentle caress of the crashing waves.
The sun was setting in Ocean City, Maryland, casting a sky of fading amber and lavender light. The golden sun dipped into the sea, a shimmering canvas of indigo and silver mirroring the evening sky.
The peaceful glow above was a sharp contrast to the turmoil clouding Khromiak’s mind—the agonizing wait for his green card and the distant unrest in his home country, Ukraine, loomed over his thoughts like a storm.
He often walked the sands of this beach when the unknown weight of the future for himself and his family in Ukraine threatened to overwhelm him.
As the last rays of sunlight melted into the sea, Khromiak closed his eyes and whispered into the soft breeze, “One day, things will be different.”
The sunset, with its promise of a new day, seemed to carry his prayer on its final, twinkling rays.
He couldn’t have known, of course, just how different things would be one day.
“If you had told me 10 years ago that I would be recognized as one of the 12 Outstanding Airmen of 2024,” said Khromiak, now a staff sergeant select in the U.S. Air Force, “I would have told you that you were crazy.”
Khromiak’s story is one of perseverance and selflessness, overcoming the odds of his circumstances and approaching life’s problems with positivity. It is also a tale that begins long before he ever stepped foot on U.S. soil.
Born in Uzhhorod, Ukraine, in 1993, Khromiak lived in a small apartment with his parents, grandfather, and older brother.
He recalls how the culture in Ukraine differed drastically from that of Western countries, where many dealings involved bribes. The prevailing mentality was that if you weren’t sharing, you were against others.
“I am so grateful my parents never took the route of bribery, even though it would have been easier,” Khromiak said. “They raised us with a different mindset—fairness and honesty.”
From a young age, Khromiak knew he wanted more for his life than what Ukraine could offer. When he was nine, his family bought a television and he saw a film starting with the New York City skyline.
“I told my grandpa that one day I would live there,” Khromiak said. “He smiled and told me that if I wanted to, then I would.”
In ninth grade, he saw an ad for a foreign exchange program to the U.S.
“My grandpa called me to the TV, where a girl from the local university was being interviewed about the program,” Khromiak said. “Two years later, I learned about the requirements: you had to be a full-time student and pay $2,500.”
At that time, $2,500 was an unreachable amount for Khromiak’s family. His mother was a baker, and his father worked at a gas station. Together, they earned just over $500 a month.
After graduating high school in 2010, Khromiak attended the local university in Uzhhorod on a math scholarship, which provided him $100 a month as long as he maintained a GPA above 4.0 out of 5.0.
After a year, he sought a summer work program in the U.S. He found a reputable company in Kyiv, a 16-hour train ride from Uzhhorod.
“I made a deal with my parents,” said Khromiak. “I would save enough to pay half of the $2,500 fee, and they would cover the other half which I would repay from the money I earned working in America.”
He saved for 18 more months to afford the program fee. After paying, he interviewed for positions in Alaska and Kentucky, but both were shut down by the State Department. He was then offered a final opportunity in Ocean City to work as a cashier at an oceanside restaurant called Seacrets Jamaica USA.
“They called me with the offer and told me I had 10 minutes to decide,” Khromiak said. “I decided to go for it and called them back.”
The program managers told him he had 48 hours to be in Kyiv for the interview. With a 16-hour train ride ahead, he and his mother rushed to buy tickets.
“It was my last shot to come to the U.S. through that program, and I was so nervous,” Khromiak said. “My selling point was my mathematics scholarship to prove I was good with numbers and could count cash for the restaurant.”
Khromiak met the employer’s representative, Christine. “I was so scared my hands were shaking, but she assured me that it would be okay,” he said. Christine gave him her card and told him to call her when he landed in the States.
Khromiak visited the U.S. for the first time in 2012.
“One of the first things I learned for my job was to smile,” he said with a laugh. “In Ukraine, nobody smiles, otherwise people think something is wrong.”
He realized the culture in the U.S. was drastically different from his home country. Making friends and being treated equally was a revelation.
Khromiak saved $2,000 that summer to bring back home. Upon returning, the dean at his university tried to extort money from him, knowing he had earned money in the U.S.
“He took away my scholarship because I didn’t give him any money,” Khromiak said. “Having returned from America, I knew things could be better, and I didn’t want to feed into their corrupt system anymore.”
Khromiak fought for his scholarship, even appealing to the university president, but to no avail.
Khromiak knew he needed to return to America. “When it came to my future in Ukraine, I realized society would only care about me if I had money,” he said. “I was determined to get a work visa to come back to the States.”
He returned to America in May 2013. With a strong connection to Christine, he received the necessary paperwork to return to Ocean City. In July, he learned he could extend his work visa through winter, and he eagerly accepted.
On the day he was set to fly back to Kyiv, his mother and cousin begged him to stay in the U.S. They feared he would be killed due to the Euromaidan protests.
“Students like me were dying while fighting for Ukraine,” Khromiak said. “I felt I should be with them, but my mother was across the world begging me to stay.”
Two friends he met at church in Maryland offered him a place to stay and helped him file for political asylum.
“My parents continued to ask me to stay in the States,” Khromiak said. “They told me they couldn’t afford to lose me, and due to the conflicts, they would be unable to take me home from the airport in Kyiv.”
Khromiak waited six months for an interview with the Department of Homeland Security and applied for temporary work authorization, but ran out of money to support himself. His friends stocked his refrigerator, bought him groceries and clothing, and treated him like family.
“The kind of selfless support I received in the U.S. wasn’t something I could have had in Ukraine, not even from my own cousins,” Khromiak said, his eyes glistening. “I would tell my mom about the kindness people showed, and she would cry in disbelief.”
Khromiak was granted his temporary work visa and began working three jobs.
“I was continuously in the dark about my future while waiting on my green card,” he said. “At the same time, the situation in Ukraine wasn’t changing.”
Spending his twenties in the U.S., Khromiak began to feel that America was becoming his true home.
“The development of the person I became happened in America,” he said. “I was born in Ukraine, but this place had become more of my true home.”
It was during these years he would walk the beaches of Ocean City and pray.
Five years after filing for political asylum, Khromiak received his green card on Halloween 2019.
“They approved my green card, and I did the most American thing I could to celebrate,” said Khromiak, the corners of his mouth pulling wider. “I went to McDonald’s.”
With his green card, he visited his family in Ukraine on January 1, 2020.
“It felt like a visit,” said Khromiak. “Not like going home.”
Despite the preciousness of seeing his family again, he said the people who took care of him in the U.S. had also become his family.
“With how much they supported and advocated for me,” Khromiak said, “I jump at any chance to help others because I’ve been helped a lot.”
It was this mindset of wanting to give back and serve the country that had supported him, that led Mykhailo Khromiak to join the U.S. military.
After exploring his options in the reserves and praying extensively about his decision, he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 2020.
“I wanted to either work in finance or intelligence,” Khromiak said. “Even though I scored high enough on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery to qualify for both, I had a very short list of jobs to choose from because I was not yet a U.S. citizen.”
He had 10 jobs to choose from. Khromiak said that because of his experience in one of his jobs as an Uber driver while waiting for his green card, he chose to work in ground transportation.
Less than a year after receiving his green card, Khromiak left for basic military training at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, in 2020.
“The hardest part of basic training was the language barrier,” Khromiak said. “The military training instructors would call cadence in a way that was very hard for me to understand.”
Despite the language challenge, Khromiak completed BMT as an honor graduate. He then attended the Ground Transportation Course at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, where he graduated as a distinguished graduate.
“I had put Luke Air Force Base, in Arizona at the top of my wish list for my first duty station,” Khromiak said. “I couldn’t believe it when I checked my orders and saw that was exactly where I was going.”
As a ground transportation specialist, Khromiak was responsible for conducting large and small-scale mission support, cargo and passenger movement, personal security details, distinguished visitor support, and other protocol services.
Khromiak became involved in the local community and discovered that his priest and his family had also immigrated from Ukraine.
In 2021, Khromiak was advised to take the Ukrainian language aptitude test, which could lead to compensation or special duties. He achieved the highest score on the Ukrainian Defense Language Proficiency Test at Luke AFB, but he didn’t expect much to come of it.
By early 2022, Khromiak had settled into life in Arizona. He bought his first home, excelled at work, and started dating his priest’s daughter, Yordana, on February 14.
Ten days later, Russia invaded Ukraine.
The attack was the largest on a European country since World War II, resulting in thousands of casualties among Ukrainian civilians and service members.
“It was still palm trees and sunshine here in Arizona for everyone else,” Khromiak said, his usual smile fading. “But my world had flipped upside down in an instant.”
In early March following the attack in Ukraine, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III ordered an additional deployment of 500 U.S. military personnel and key enablers to locations across Europe.
Khromiak was among those 500 Airmen.
Khromiak’s supervisor informed him he had been hand-selected for short-notice orders to an undisclosed location in Europe. No one in his chain of command knew where he would be going or what he would be doing. They only knew that if he accepted, he would have to leave the following month.
“I was torn between two worlds,” Khromiak said. “My life here, with my new home and relationship that meant so much to me, and my duty to both the U.S. and my home country.”
Khromiak said that senior leadership , told him that this was his chance to serve both of his countries. After their conversation, Khromiak knew he would do whatever was needed.
“The news that I would be leaving so soon with no certainty of where I would be going was hard for Yordana,” Khromiak said. “But she was willing to wait for me, even though our relationship had just begun.”
On the day before Easter 2022, Khromiak flew from Arizona to Maryland for an 18-hour layover before traveling to Ramstein Air Base, Germany, to serve at the 603rd Air Operations Center.
While deployed, Khromiak served as the lead linguist and translator, coordinating multinational relations between the Department of Defense, Ukraine, and NATO partners.
He advanced real-time Ukrainian language support, developed a $273 million translation guide, highlighted hostile activity from enemy targets, and acted as the critical command and control liaison for a 24/7 Air Domain Awareness Cell.
“I was working with high-ranking officers as a junior enlisted Airman,” Khromiak said. “It was nerve-racking at first, but I soon learned that we were all part of one team, one fight.”
He led a diverse 10-member team of non-commissioned officers, senior non-commissioned officers, and company grade officers, alerting forces to 2,000 air threats and 1,500 impending ballistic missiles, safeguarding 43 million lives across 24 regions.
“The hardest thing about the deployment wasn’t working in a 24/7 operation or not having my own shower,” Khromiak said. “It was being away from Yordana.”
He made sure to call her whenever possible and sent flowers monthly, counting the days until they could be reunited.
When the countdown reached 30 days until they would be together again, senior leadership asked to speak with him.
“They told me that no one else could fill my role once I left,” Khromiak said. “They needed me and asked me to stay another six months.”
Though he was committed to his duties, Khromiak told them he needed to make a phone call first.
“As soon as I could call Yordana, I told her to add 180 days to her 30-day countdown,” Khromiak said. “She didn’t speak to me for three days after that.”
He felt torn, having chosen his duty over the girl he loved. He accepted the new orders only on the condition of being able to return home for a visit.
His leadership allowed him to take two weeks of leave before returning to the 603rd AOC.
“I surprised her,” Khromiak said, his eyes bright. “I left flowers and a cake outside her door and texted her that I had something delivered to her house. When she stepped outside, there I was.”
The weeks Khromiak spent at home with her and her family were priceless to him. Although saying goodbye again was difficult, he returned with renewed determination.
During the rest of his tour, he received the Air Force Commendation Medal, was selected for the 56th Fighter Wing’s top Below-the-Zone promotion, and received coins from Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force Joanne Bass, U.S. Air Forces in Europe leadership, and recieved the Chief of Intel coin.
After 12 months deployed to Germany, Khromiak returned to Luke AFB in April 2023.
Back home, he continued his duties as a ground transportation specialist and worked stateside to continue providing Ukrainian language support.
Just a few months later, in the summer, he proposed to Yordana.
“I originally planned to wait until Christmas,” Khromiak said. “But I knew she was the one. Who else would have waited a year for me?”
They married in January of the following year and saved money for their honeymoon until July, when they visited 13 different countries.
“Two weeks into our vacation, we were having dinner in Venice when I got a call from the Air Education Training Command deputy commander and AETC command chief,” Khromiak said. “That was the moment I found out I had been recognized as one of the Air Force’s 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year.”
The Outstanding Airman Program annually recognizes 12 enlisted members as the service’s top enlisted members for superior leadership, job performance, community involvement, and personal achievements.
Even through this incredible honor, Khromiak stays humble and said for him, his service was never about getting an award.
“Saving lives was so rewarding,” Khromiak said. “That has been the greatest honor above everything else.”
Khromiak’s journey from walking alone on the beaches of Ocean City to working on global defense missions embodies the resilience and dedication that will drive the USAF’s success in the competition for global air superiority.
His unwavering commitment and character not only set an exceptional standard for Airmen to strive for, but also serves as a beacon of hope for those who too, yearn for a different life.