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Sparse trees hide the entrance. A descending timber tunnel leads down to a brightly lit welcome zone. There is a surgery unit, equipped with gurneys, cardiac monitors and ventilators. And cabinets stocked of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of spare clothes. Within a staff room with a washing machine and hot water heater, physicians keep an eye on a screen. It shows the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they zigzag in the sky above.

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

This is the nation's secret underground medical facility. This center opened in August and is the second of its kind, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the frontline and the urban area of a key location in the Donetsk region. “We are 6 metres under the earth. This is the safest method of providing help to our wounded soldiers. And it keeps healthcare workers protected,” stated the facility's surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station handles thirty to forty casualties a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic limb trauma necessitating amputations, or serious stomach wounds. Some patients can move on their own. Almost all are the casualties of Russian first-person view (FPV) drones, which release explosives with deadly accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from first-person view drones. We see minimal gunshot wounds. It’s an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

Maj the senior surgeon at the subterranean facility for caring for wounded soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

During one afternoon recently, a group of three soldiers walked with difficulty into the hospital. The most lightly injured, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, reported an first-person view drone blast had torn a minor wound in his limb. “Conflict is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He collapsed. Then the Russians dropped a second explosive on him.” He added: “All structures in the village is destroyed. There are UAVs everywhere and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

The soldier explained his unit spent 43 days in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been trying to seize for many months. Sole access to get to their position was on foot. Necessary provisions arrived by drone: food and water. Seven days after he was hurt, he walked 5km (roughly three miles), requiring several hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medical staff checked his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with new civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a pair of light-colored jeans.

The soldier, twenty-eight, said a first-person view drone ripped a minor injury in his leg.

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, recounted a drone blast had left him with concussion. “I was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it went dark. I lost sensation anything or hear anything,” he explained. “I think I was fortunate to survive. My cousin has been killed. There are ongoing detonations.” A construction worker working in a neighboring country, he said he had come back to his homeland and enlisted to serve shortly before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in early 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been hit in the back. He groaned as doctors laid him on a bed, took off a stained dressing and cleaned his two-day-old injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to ring his sister. “A piece of mortar hit me. It was a ricochet. I’m OK,” he told her. What were his plans now? “To recover. That will take a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my military group. Our forces has to protect our nation,” he affirmed.

Medical staff care for the wounded soldier, who was injured in the back by a piece of artillery shell.

Since 2022, Russia has consistently attacked hospitals, health facilities, obstetric units and ambulances. According to international monitors, over two hundred health workers have been fatally attacked in nearly 2,000 assaults. The underground facility is constructed from four steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and granular material placed above up to ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple eight-kilogram explosive devices released by drone.

A major industrial group, which funded the construction, intends to erect 20 facilities in total. A senior official of the nation's national security council and ex- military leader, Rustem Umerov, said they would be “critically essential for saving the lives of our military and assisting troops on the battlefront.” The company referred to the project as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had undertaken after the enemy's military offensive.

An example of the facility's operating theatres.

The surgeon, explained some injured soldiers had to wait hours or even days before they could be transported due to the danger of air assaults. “Our facility received a pair of severely injured patients who came at the early hours. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's bleeding control device had been on for such an extended period there was no alternative.” How did he cope with traumatic operations? “My career in medicine for 20 years. One must concentrate,” he said.

Orderlies transported Mykolaichuk through the passage and into an ambulance. The vehicle was stationed beneath a shrub. The patient and the other soldiers were transferred to the urban center of Dnipro for further treatment. The subterranean medical team paused for rest. The facility's orange feline, the mascot, padded up to the doorway to await the next arrivals. “Our facility operates open 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”