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Scrubby foliage conceal the entryway. One descending wooden tunnel descends to a brightly lit reception area. There is a operating ward, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. And cabinets full of medical equipment, drugs and organized stacks of extra garments. In a staff room with a laundry appliance and kettle, physicians keep an eye on a display. The screen reveals the flight patterns of enemy surveillance UAVs as they weave in the sky above.

Hospital staff at an subterranean hospital observe a screen showing Russian suicide and surveillance drones in the area.

This is the nation's secret underground medical facility. The facility began operations in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, situated in the eastern part of the country close to the combat zone and the city of a key location in the Donetsk region. “We are six meters under the ground. It’s the safest method of delivering care to our injured soldiers. It also ensures medical personnel protected,” stated the facility's surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point handles 30-40 casualties a each day. Their conditions vary. Some have catastrophic leg injuries necessitating amputations, or severe abdominal injuries. Some patients can walk. The vast majority are the casualties of Russian FPV aerial devices, which release grenades with deadly precision. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from first-person view drones. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

Major the senior surgeon at the underground facility for caring for wounded soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

During one day recently, three military members walked with difficulty into the facility. The most lightly injured, 28-year-old one soldier, said an FPV explosion had torn a minor wound in his leg. “Conflict is horrific. My comrade next to me, a fellow soldier, was killed,” he said. “He collapsed. Then the Russians dropped a second explosive on him.” He continued: “Everything in the village is destroyed. There are UAVs all around and casualties. Our side's and theirs.”

Dvorskyi explained his squad spent over a month in a forest area near Pokrovsk, which Russia has been trying to seize for many months. The only way to reach their position was on foot. All supplies arrived by quadcopter: food and water. Seven days after he was hurt, he walked five kilometers (about 3 miles), taking three hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medic checked his vital signs. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with fresh non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of pale jeans.

The soldier, twenty-eight, said a FPV drone caused a minor injury in his leg.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, said a drone blast had left him with concussion. “I was in a dugout. It suddenly became black. I couldn’t feel anything or any sound,” he explained. “I believe I was lucky to survive. A relative has been lost. We face continuous explosions.” A construction worker employed in Lithuania, he noted he had returned to Ukraine and enlisted to serve days before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

A third soldier, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the back. He groaned as medical staff laid him on a bed, removed a stained dressing and cleaned his recent shrapnel wound. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he borrowed a mobile phone to call his family member. “A fragment of mortar struck me. It was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To get better. That will take a several months. After that, to return to my military group. Someone must defend our nation,” he said.

Medical staff treat Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the back by a fragment of artillery shell.

Since 2022, enemy forces has repeatedly targeted medical centers, health facilities, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. According to international monitors, over two hundred medical personnel have been fatally attacked in nearly 2,000 attacks. This subterranean hospital is built from four steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and sand placed above up to the surface. It is designed to resist impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even three 8kg TNT charges dropped by aerial means.

The Ukrainian industrial group, which financed the building, intends to erect twenty units in all. A senior official of Ukraine’s national security council and ex- defence minister, the official, said they would be “vitally important for preserving the lives of our military and supporting troops on the battlefront.” The company described the project as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had undertaken since Russia’s invasion.

An example of the facility's operating theatres.

The surgeon, said some wounded soldiers had to wait hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated because of the danger of air assaults. “We had two critically ill casualties who came at 3am. It was necessary to carry out a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's bleeding control device had been applied for so long there was no other option.” What is his method with severe operations? “My career in medicine for 20 years. One must focus,” he said.

Medical assistants transported Mykolaichuk through the passage and into an ambulance. The vehicle was stationed under a bush. He and the two other soldiers were taken to the city of Dnipro for further treatment. The underground medical team took a break. The facility's ginger cat, the mascot, walked up to the entrance to await the next arrivals. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “It doesn’t stop.”