Sailors Without Borders

Humanitarian aid for Ukraine

When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, warehouses across Poland filled with donations within days — but moving aid safely to the people who needed it was another matter entirely. SWB built a verified network of NGOs, embassies, and donors, and organised over 30 convoys delivering food, water, medicine, and supplies across Ukraine. Convoys have continued since.

Safe Haven for Ukrainian Refugees

In the weeks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, temporary shelters across Poland were filling beyond capacity — crowded, under-equipped, and offering little more than a floor and a roof. SWB designed the Safe Haven project to do something different: provide genuine accommodation, meals, schooling, and support for over 100 of the most vulnerable refugees, for the duration they needed it. The project ran from May 2022 and was completed after several months of operation.

SAILORS WITHOUT BORDERS

SWB exists to provide help wherever it is most needed — on the water, at borders, in conflict zones, and in communities hosting people forced to flee. We act when human life is at risk. We do not wait for conditions to be ideal. We are sailors — when a life needs to be rescued from danger, we react. It’s our moral rule.

ABOUT US

The Crew

SWB is the people who make it. Sailors, lawyers, translators, psychologists, logisticians — and anyone with skills and the willingness to use them. If you want to be part of it, we want to hear from you.

JOIN THE CREW

Years of continuous operation

Countries of operation

Refugees housed

Tonnes of humanitarian aid delivered

Sailors Without Borders (SWB) is a humanitarian foundation founded in 2016 by a group of sailors who believed that the duty to rescue people in danger at sea is not a matter of choice — it is a moral and legal obligation. What began as a small volunteer crew conducting search-and-rescue operations in the Mediterranean has grown into a multidisciplinary humanitarian organisation operating across Europe and North Africa.

SWB works wherever people are most vulnerable:

on the sea, at borders, in conflict zones, and in communities hosting displaced populations. Over nearly a decade of operations, SWB has delivered emergency relief in Greece, Italy, Malta, Libya, Poland, and Ukraine — responding to the refugee crisis, the war in Ukraine, and other humanitarian emergencies as they arise.

The organisation is registered as a foundation in Poland and operates in full compliance with Polish law and international humanitarian standards.