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Sparse trees conceal the entrance. One sloping wooden tunnel leads down to a brightly lit reception area. Inside lies a surgery unit, equipped with gurneys, heart rate sensors and breathing machines. And shelves full of medical equipment, drugs and neat piles of extra garments. Within a break area with a washing machine and hot water heater, physicians monitor a screen. It shows the movements of enemy spy drones as they weave in the air above.

Medical staff at an underground hospital look at a screen displaying enemy kamikaze and reconnaissance UAVs in the region.

This is the nation's secret below-ground hospital. The facility opened in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, situated in eastern Ukraine close to the combat zone and the city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits 6 metres under the ground. This is the safest method of providing help to our injured military personnel. It also ensures medical personnel safe,” stated the clinic’s surgeon, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point treats thirty to forty patients a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic leg injuries necessitating amputations, or serious abdominal injuries. Others can walk. The vast majority are the victims of Russian first-person view (FPV) drones, which release explosives with deadly accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from FPVs. We see minimal bullet injuries. It’s an era of unmanned aircraft and a new type of war,” the doctor said.

Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko at the underground installation for treating wounded soldiers in the eastern region.

On one day last week, three soldiers limped into the hospital. The most lightly injured, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, reported an first-person view drone explosion had ripped a minor wound in his leg. “War is terrible. My comrade beside me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Subsequently the enemy forces dropped a second explosive on him.” He continued: “All structures in the village is demolished. There are UAVs all around and bodies. Ours and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi said his squad endured 43 days in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been trying to seize for many months. The only way to reach their position was on foot. Necessary provisions came by drone: rations and water. A week following he was hurt, he walked five kilometers (about 3 miles), requiring several hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medical staff assessed his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with fresh civilian clothes: a shirt and a set of pale jeans.

The soldier, twenty-eight, said a first-person view drone caused a small hole in his lower limb.

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, said a UAV explosion had left him with concussion. “My position was in a trench shelter. It suddenly became black. I lost sensation anything or hear anything,” he explained. “I believe I was lucky to survive. A relative has been killed. We face continuous detonations.” A builder employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk noted he had come back to Ukraine and enlisted to fight shortly before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in early 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been struck in the back. He groaned as medical staff placed him on a medical cot, took off a stained dressing and cleaned his recent shrapnel wound. Covered in a foil blanket, he borrowed a mobile phone to ring his sister. “A piece of artillery struck me. It was a ricochet. I’m OK,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To get better. That will take a few months. After that, to go back to my unit. Someone has to protect our nation,” he said.

Medical staff treat the wounded soldier, who was hit in the dorsal area by a piece of artillery shell.

Since 2022, Russia has repeatedly attacked hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards and ambulances. According to human rights groups, over two hundred health workers have been killed in almost two thousand attacks. This subterranean hospital is constructed from multiple steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and granular material placed above up to the surface. It is designed to resist impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even three 8kg explosive devices released by aerial means.

A major steel and mining company, which funded the building, intends to build 20 units in total. The head of the nation's security agency and former military leader, Rustem Umerov, said they would be “critically essential for preserving the survival of our armed forces and assisting defenders on the frontline.” The company referred to the initiative as the “largest-scale and challenging” it had implemented since the enemy's military offensive.

An example of the centre’s surgical rooms.

Holovashchenko, explained some injured personnel had to endure delays many hours or even multiple days before they could be transported because of the danger of aerial attacks. “Our facility received a pair of severely injured casualties who arrived at 3am. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on a patient. His tourniquet had been on for such an extended period there was no other option.” What is his method with traumatic operations? “I’ve been healthcare for 20 years. One must focus,” he remarked.

Medical assistants wheeled Mykolaichuk up the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed under a bush. He and the other soldiers were taken to the city of Dnipro for further treatment. The subterranean medical team paused for rest. The facility's orange feline, Vasilevs, walked toward the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates open around the clock,” the surgeon said. “It doesn’t stop.”