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Scrubby foliage conceal the entrance. One descending wooden passageway leads down to a well-illuminated reception area. Inside lies a surgery unit, outfitted with beds, heart rate sensors and breathing machines. Plus cabinets stocked of healthcare supplies, drugs and neat piles of extra garments. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, doctors keep an eye on a screen. The screen reveals the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they zigzag in the sky above.

Hospital personnel at an underground hospital observe a screen showing enemy kamikaze and surveillance UAVs in the area.

This is the nation's covert underground hospital. The facility opened in August and is the second such installation, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the frontline and the urban area of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits six meters under the ground. This is the safest method of providing help to our injured soldiers. It also ensures medical personnel safe,” said the clinic’s surgeon, Maj the chief surgeon.

This medical station handles thirty to forty casualties a each day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic leg injuries requiring amputations, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. Almost all are the victims of Russian first-person view (FPV) drones, which release explosives with lethal precision. “90% of our cases are from FPVs. We see minimal bullet injuries. This is an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the surgeon explained.

Maj the senior surgeon at the underground installation for caring for injured troops in eastern Ukraine.

On one day last week, a group of three soldiers walked with difficulty into the facility. The most lightly injured, twenty-eight-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, said an FPV blast 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 fell down. Then the enemy forces released a another explosive on him.” He added: “Everything in the settlement is destroyed. There are UAVs everywhere and bodies. Our side's and theirs.”

The soldier explained his unit endured over a month in a wooded zone near the city, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture since last year. Sole access to get to their position was by walking. Necessary provisions came by drone: food and water. Seven days following he was injured, he walked 5km (roughly three miles), taking three hours, to where an military transport was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic checked his vital signs. Following care, a medical attendant gave him new civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

Artem Dvorskiy, twenty-eight, stated a first-person view aerial device ripped a minor injury in his lower limb.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, recounted a drone blast had left him with a head injury. “My position was in a dugout. It suddenly went dark. I lost sensation anything or any sound,” he explained. “I think I was lucky to remain alive. A relative has been killed. There are continuous detonations.” A construction worker working in Lithuania, Filipchuk noted he had returned to Ukraine and volunteered to serve shortly before Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion in early 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been hit in the upper body. He groaned as doctors placed him on a bed, removed a bloody dressing and cleaned his recent injury from fragments. Covered in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to ring his family member. “A fragment of artillery struck me. It was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To recover. This may require a several months. After that, to return to my military group. Someone has to protect our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors care for the wounded soldier, who was hit in the back by a fragment of artillery shell.

Since 2022, enemy forces has repeatedly attacked hospitals, health facilities, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. Per human rights groups, over two hundred health workers have been fatally attacked in nearly two thousand attacks. The underground facility is constructed from four reinforced shelters, with wooden supports, soil and granular material laid on top reaching ground level. It can withstand direct hits from 152mm projectiles and even three eight-kilogram explosive devices released by drone.

A major steel and mining company, which financed the building, plans to erect 20 units in total. The head of Ukraine’s national security council and ex- military leader, the official, declared they would be “critically essential for saving the survival of our armed forces and assisting troops on the frontline.” The company referred to the initiative as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had undertaken after the enemy's military offensive.

An example of the centre’s operating theatres.

Holovashchenko, said certain wounded soldiers had to wait hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated due to the danger of aerial attacks. “We had a pair of critically ill casualties who came at 3am. I had to carry out a double amputation on a patient. His tourniquet had been applied for such an extended period there was no other option.” How did he cope with severe operations? “I’ve been healthcare for 20 years. One must concentrate,” he said.

Medical assistants transported Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an ambulance. The vehicle was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the two other military members were transferred to the urban center of Dnipro for further treatment. The underground medical team took a break. The hospital’s orange feline, the mascot, walked up to the entrance to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” the surgeon stated. “The work is continuous.”