MIAMI — Adrian Kellgren’s family-owned gun company in Cocoa, Florida was left holding a $200,000 shipment of semi-automatic rifles after a longtime customer in Ukraine suddenly went silent during Vladimir Putin’s invasion of the country.
Fearing the worst, Kellgren and his company KelTec are now sending those 400 guns to Ukraine’s nascent resistance movement to help civilians fight back against the Russian military.
“The American people want to do something,” The Associated Press reports Kellgren, a former U.S. Navy pilot, said. “We enjoy our freedoms, we cherish those things. And when we see a group of people out there getting hammered like this, it’s heartbreaking.”
KelTec is a high-profile example of Americans seeking to collect guns, ammunition and tactical gear for Ukrainian civilians. But many efforts have been snarled by the complex regulations governing the international shipment of such equipment.
Kellgren was able to contact a diplomat in the Ukrainian Embassy through a neighbor who helped him obtain a federal arms export license in just four days, AP explains.
Workers reportedly began to forklift four plastic-wrapped pallets containing rifles at KelTec's warehouse to deliver to an undisclosed NATO-run facility.
After arriving there, AP reports Ukraine's Ministry of Defense will be responsible for getting the weapons into the war zone.
“That’s when the real derring-do and heroism begins,” Kellgren said to AP.
KelTec is hopeful of arranging more shipments in the future.
10 Tampa Bay's Courtney Holland contributed to this report.
