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Sparse trees hide the entryway. A descending timber tunnel descends to a well-illuminated welcome zone. Inside lies a operating ward, outfitted with gurneys, heart rate sensors and breathing machines. Plus cabinets stocked of medical equipment, medications and neat piles of spare clothes. Within a break area with a laundry appliance and hot water heater, doctors monitor a display. The screen reveals the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they weave in the air above.

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

This is the nation's covert below-ground hospital. The facility began operations in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, located in eastern Ukraine not far from the frontline and the urban area of a key location in the Donetsk region. “We are six meters below the earth. This is the most secure way of providing help to our injured military personnel. And it keeps medical personnel protected,” said the clinic’s surgeon, Maj the chief surgeon.

This medical station handles 30-40 casualties a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from devastating leg injuries requiring amputations, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. The vast majority are the casualties of enemy FPV drones, which release explosives with lethal precision. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from first-person view drones. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. It’s an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the doctor explained.

Maj the senior surgeon at the underground installation for treating injured troops in the eastern region.

During one day recently, a group of three soldiers walked with difficulty into the hospital. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, said an first-person view drone blast had torn a minor wound in his leg. “War is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was killed,” he stated. “He collapsed. Subsequently the enemy forces dropped a another grenade on him.” He continued: “Everything in the settlement is demolished. We see UAVs all around and bodies. Ours and the enemy's.”

The soldier explained his unit spent 43 days in a wooded zone close to the city, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture since last year. The only way to reach their position was by walking. Necessary provisions arrived by drone: rations and water. Seven days following he was hurt, he traveled 5km (about 3 miles), taking three hours, to a point where an armoured vehicle was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his physical condition. After treatment, a medical attendant provided him with fresh civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a pair of pale jeans.

The soldier, twenty-eight, stated a FPV drone ripped a minor injury in his lower limb.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, recounted a UAV explosion had resulted in a head injury. “I was in a trench shelter. It suddenly became black. I couldn’t feel anything or hear anything,” he explained. “I think I was fortunate to remain alive. My cousin has been lost. We face continuous detonations.” A construction worker working in a neighboring country, he noted he had come back to Ukraine and enlisted to fight shortly before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been hit in the upper body. He expressed pain as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained dressing and treated his two-day-old shrapnel wound. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to call his family member. “A piece of mortar hit me. It was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he told her. What were his plans now? “To get better. This may require a few months. After that, to go back to my unit. Someone must defend our nation,” he said.

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

Over the past years, Russia has consistently targeted medical centers, health facilities, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. According to international monitors, over two hundred medical personnel have been killed in nearly 2,000 attacks. This subterranean hospital is constructed from four steel bunkers, with timber beams, soil and granular material placed above up to the surface. It can withstand direct hits from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple eight-kilogram explosive devices dropped by drone.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which financed the building, plans to erect twenty units in total. A senior official of Ukraine’s security agency and ex- military leader, the official, declared they would be “vitally essential for preserving the survival of our military and assisting defenders on the frontline.” The company referred to the project as the “largest-scale and challenging” it had undertaken after Russia’s military offensive.

An example of the facility's surgical rooms.

The surgeon, said certain injured soldiers had to endure delays many hours or even multiple days before they could be transported because of the threat of aerial attacks. “We had a pair of severely injured patients who arrived at the early hours. It was necessary to carry out a double amputation on a patient. His tourniquet had been on for so long there was no other option.” What is his method with severe surgeries? “My career in healthcare for 20 years. You have to concentrate,” he said.

Orderlies wheeled Mykolaichuk up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The transport was parked under a shrub. The patient and the other soldiers were transferred to the city of Dnipro for further treatment. The underground medical team took a break. The facility's ginger cat, Vasilevs, padded toward the entrance to await the incoming patients. “Our facility operates open around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”