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Sparse trees hide the entryway. A descending wooden passageway descends to a well-illuminated welcome zone. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. And cabinets stocked of healthcare supplies, medications and neat piles of extra garments. Within a break area with a washing machine and kettle, physicians keep an eye on a display. It shows the movements of Russian spy drones as they zigzag in the sky above.

Medical staff at an underground hospital observe a monitor showing Russian suicide and surveillance drones in the region.

This is Ukraine’s secret underground hospital. This center opened in August and is the second such installation, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the combat zone and the urban area of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits 6 metres under the ground. This is the most secure way of delivering care to our wounded military personnel. It also ensures healthcare workers safe,” said the clinic’s surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point treats thirty to forty casualties a each day. Their conditions vary. Some have devastating limb trauma necessitating amputations, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can move on their own. The vast majority are the casualties of Russian FPV drones, which release grenades with lethal accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from first-person view drones. We see minimal bullet injuries. It’s an age of drones and a different kind of war,” the surgeon explained.

Major the senior surgeon at the subterranean installation for treating wounded troops in eastern Ukraine.

On one day last week, a group of three soldiers limped into the facility. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old one soldier, said an FPV explosion had ripped a small hole in his leg. “Conflict is terrible. My comrade beside me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Then the enemy forces dropped a another grenade on him.” He continued: “All structures in the settlement is destroyed. There are UAVs all around and casualties. Ours and theirs.”

The soldier explained his squad endured 43 days in a wooded zone close to the city, which enemy forces has been trying to seize for many months. The only way to reach their position was on foot. All supplies came by quadcopter: rations and water. A week following he was hurt, he walked 5km (about 3 miles), taking three hours, to a point where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic assessed his vital signs. After treatment, a nurse provided him with fresh civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a set of pale jeans.

Artem Dvorskiy, 28, stated a first-person view drone caused a small hole in his lower limb.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, said a UAV explosion had resulted in concussion. “My position was in a dugout. It suddenly became black. I lost sensation any feeling or hear anything,” he said. “I think I was lucky to survive. My cousin has been lost. There are continuous detonations.” A builder working in a neighboring country, Filipchuk noted he had returned to his homeland and enlisted to serve shortly before the Russian leader's large-scale attack in early 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been hit in the upper body. He expressed pain as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained bandage and cleaned his recent injury from fragments. Covered in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to call his family member. “A piece of artillery struck me. It was a deflected projectile. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To recover. That will take a several months. After that, to go back to my military group. Our forces has to protect our nation,” he affirmed.

Doctors care for Taras Mykolaichuk, who was injured in the dorsal area by a piece of mortar.

Over the past years, Russia has repeatedly attacked hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. Per human rights groups, over two hundred health workers have been fatally attacked in almost two thousand assaults. The underground facility is built from multiple steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and granular material placed above up to ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple 8kg TNT charges released by aerial means.

A major industrial group, which funded the construction, plans to erect 20 units in all. The head of Ukraine’s security agency and former defence minister, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “critically important for preserving the survival of our armed forces and supporting defenders on the battlefront.” The company referred to the project as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had implemented since the enemy's invasion.

An example of the facility's surgical rooms.

Holovashchenko, said certain wounded personnel had to wait many hours or even days before they could be transported due to the threat of air assaults. “Our facility received a pair of critically ill patients who arrived at the early hours. It was necessary to carry out a double amputation on one of them. His tourniquet had been on for so long there was no alternative.” What is his method with traumatic operations? “My career in medicine for 20 years. One must focus,” he said.

Medical assistants wheeled Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an ambulance. The vehicle was stationed under a shrub. He and the two other soldiers were taken to the urban center of a major city for additional medical care. The subterranean hospital staff took a break. The hospital’s ginger cat, the mascot, walked toward the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates open 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko stated. “The work is continuous.”