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Sparse trees conceal the entryway. One descending wooden passageway descends to a well-illuminated reception area. Inside lies a operating ward, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and ventilators. Plus shelves stocked of medical equipment, medications and neat piles of spare clothes. In a break area with a washing machine and hot water heater, doctors keep an eye on a display. The screen reveals the movements of Russian spy drones as they weave in the sky above.

Medical personnel at an underground medical center look at a monitor displaying enemy kamikaze and surveillance UAVs in the region.

Welcome to Ukraine’s covert below-ground medical facility. This center began operations in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, located in eastern Ukraine close to the combat zone and the urban area of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region. “We are 6 metres under the earth. It’s the most secure way of providing help to our wounded military personnel. It also ensures healthcare workers protected,” stated the clinic’s surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station treats thirty to forty casualties a day. Cases differ widely. Some have catastrophic limb trauma necessitating amputations, or serious abdominal injuries. Others can walk. The vast majority are the victims of Russian first-person view (FPV) aerial devices, which release grenades with deadly accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from first-person view drones. We encounter few bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a new type of war,” the doctor said.

Maj the senior surgeon at the subterranean installation for caring for injured troops in the eastern region.

During one day last week, a group of three military members walked with difficulty into the hospital. The least severely hurt, twenty-eight-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, said an FPV explosion had torn a minor wound in his leg. “War is horrific. The guy next to me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he stated. “He collapsed. Then the Russians dropped a second grenade on him.” He continued: “All structures in the village is destroyed. We see UAVs everywhere and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi said his squad endured 43 days in a wooded zone close to the city, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to reach their location was on foot. Necessary provisions arrived by quadcopter: rations and drinking water. Seven days following he was injured, he walked five kilometers (roughly three miles), taking three hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medical staff checked his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant gave him fresh civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

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

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, recounted a UAV explosion had left him with concussion. “I was in a dugout. It suddenly went dark. I couldn’t feel any feeling or hear anything,” he said. “I think I was lucky to survive. A relative has been killed. There are ongoing detonations.” A construction worker employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk noted he had come back to his homeland and volunteered to fight days before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in February 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been hit in the back. He expressed pain as doctors laid him on a bed, removed a stained bandage and treated his two-day-old shrapnel wound. Covered in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to call his family member. “A piece of artillery struck me. The cause was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. That will take a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my military group. Someone has to protect our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors care for Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the dorsal area by a piece of artillery shell.

Since 2022, Russia has consistently targeted hospitals, clinics, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. According to international monitors, 261 medical personnel have been killed in almost 2,000 attacks. This subterranean hospital is constructed from multiple steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and granular material placed above up to ground level. It can withstand direct hits from large-caliber artillery shells and even three eight-kilogram explosive devices released by aerial means.

A major industrial group, which financed the construction, plans to erect 20 units in all. The head of Ukraine’s security agency and ex- military leader, the official, said they would be “critically essential for saving the survival of our armed forces and assisting troops on the battlefront.” The organization referred to the project as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had implemented since the enemy's military offensive.

An example of the facility's surgical rooms.

Holovashchenko, explained some wounded personnel had to endure delays hours or even days before they could be transported because of the danger of air assaults. “Our facility received a pair of severely injured casualties who came at the early hours. I had to carry out a double amputation on one of them. The soldier's tourniquet had been applied for so long there was no alternative.” What is his method with traumatic operations? “I’ve been medicine for two decades. One must concentrate,” he remarked.

Medical assistants wheeled Mykolaichuk up the passage and into an ambulance. The transport was parked beneath a bush. The patient and the two other soldiers were transferred to the city of Dnipro for additional medical care. The underground medical team paused for rest. The hospital’s ginger cat, Vasilevs, walked toward the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” the surgeon said. “The work is continuous.”