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Scrubby trees conceal the entrance. One sloping wooden tunnel leads down to a brightly lit reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and ventilators. And shelves stocked of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. In a staff room with a washing machine and hot water heater, doctors keep an eye on a screen. The screen reveals the movements of Russian surveillance UAVs as they weave in the sky above.

Hospital staff at an underground medical center look at a monitor showing Russian suicide and reconnaissance UAVs in the area.

This is Ukraine’s secret underground hospital. The facility began operations in August and is the second of its kind, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the combat zone and the city of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits 6 metres under the earth. It’s the safest way of delivering care to our injured military personnel. And it keeps medical personnel protected,” stated the facility's surgeon, Major the chief surgeon.

The stabilisation point treats thirty to forty casualties a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from devastating limb trauma requiring surgical removal, or serious abdominal injuries. Others can walk. Almost all are the casualties of enemy FPV aerial devices, which release explosives with deadly accuracy. “90% of our cases are from FPVs. We see few bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a new type of conflict,” the doctor said.

Major the senior surgeon at the subterranean installation for caring for injured soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

On one afternoon recently, three military members walked with difficulty into the facility. The least severely hurt, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, said an FPV blast had torn a small hole in his leg. “War is horrific. The guy beside me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he stated. “He fell down. Subsequently the enemy forces dropped a second explosive on him.” He added: “All structures in the village is demolished. There are drones everywhere and bodies. Our side's and theirs.”

The soldier said his unit endured over a month in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to reach their location was on foot. Necessary provisions came by drone: food and drinking water. Seven days after he was hurt, he traveled five kilometers (about 3 miles), requiring several hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic checked his physical condition. After treatment, a nurse gave him new non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

Artem Dvorskiy, twenty-eight, said a FPV aerial device caused a small hole in his lower limb.

A different casualty, 38-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, said a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “My position was in a dugout. Suddenly it went dark. I lost sensation anything or hear anything,” he explained. “I believe I was fortunate to survive. A relative has been lost. There are ongoing detonations.” A builder working in Lithuania, he noted he had returned to Ukraine and enlisted to fight days before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the upper body. He groaned as medical staff placed him on a medical cot, took off a stained bandage and cleaned his two-day-old shrapnel wound. Covered in a foil blanket, he used a mobile phone to call his family member. “A fragment of artillery hit me. The cause was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To get better. That will take a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my military group. Our forces must protect our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors treat Taras Mykolaichuk, who was injured in the back by a piece of mortar.

Over the past years, Russia has consistently attacked medical centers, health facilities, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. According to human rights groups, 261 medical personnel have been killed in almost 2,000 assaults. The underground facility is built from four steel bunkers, with timber beams, soil and sand laid on top reaching ground level. It can withstand direct hits from large-caliber artillery shells and even three 8kg explosive devices released by drone.

A major industrial group, which financed the construction, plans to build 20 units in all. The head of the nation's security agency and former military leader, the official, said they would be “vitally important for saving the lives of our military and assisting defenders on the battlefront.” The company described the initiative as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had implemented since Russia’s military offensive.

An example of the facility's operating theatres.

The surgeon, explained some injured personnel had to endure delays hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated due to the threat of aerial attacks. “Our facility received two severely injured patients who arrived at 3am. I had to perform a removal of both limbs on a patient. His bleeding control device had been applied for such an extended period there was no other option.” What is his method with traumatic operations? “My career in healthcare for 20 years. You have to focus,” he said.

Orderlies wheeled the soldier up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was parked beneath a bush. The patient and the other military members were transferred to the city of Dnipro for further treatment. The subterranean hospital staff took a break. The facility's ginger cat, the mascot, padded toward the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates active 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko stated. “It doesn’t stop.”