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Scrubby foliage hide the entryway. A descending timber passageway descends to a well-illuminated welcome zone. There is a operating ward, equipped with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. Plus shelves full of healthcare supplies, drugs and neat piles of extra garments. Within a break area with a washing machine and hot water heater, physicians keep an eye on a display. The screen reveals the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they weave in the air above.

Hospital staff at an subterranean medical center observe a screen displaying enemy kamikaze and surveillance UAVs in the region.

Welcome to the nation's covert underground medical facility. This center opened in August and is the second such installation, located in eastern Ukraine close to the frontline and the city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits six meters below the earth. It’s the safest way of delivering care to our wounded soldiers. It also ensures medical personnel protected,” stated the facility's surgeon, Major the chief surgeon.

This medical station treats thirty to forty patients a day. Cases differ widely. Some have catastrophic limb trauma necessitating surgical removal, or serious abdominal injuries. Others can move on their own. The vast majority are the victims of enemy FPV aerial devices, which release explosives with deadly accuracy. “90% of our cases are from first-person view drones. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. This is an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the doctor said.

Major the senior surgeon at the subterranean installation for treating wounded troops in eastern Ukraine.

During one day last week, three soldiers walked with difficulty into the hospital. The most lightly injured, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, reported an first-person view drone blast had ripped a small hole in his limb. “War is horrific. The guy beside me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Subsequently the Russians dropped a second grenade on him.” He added: “Everything in the settlement is demolished. We see drones all around and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi said his unit spent 43 days in a forest area close to 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 quadcopter: rations and water. A week after he was hurt, he walked five kilometers (about 3 miles), requiring three hours, to a point where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medical staff checked his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with fresh non-military attire: a T-shirt and a set of light-colored jeans.

The soldier, twenty-eight, stated a first-person view drone ripped a small hole in his lower limb.

A different casualty, thirty-eight-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, recounted a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “I was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it became black. I lost sensation anything or any sound,” he said. “I believe I was lucky to survive. A relative has been lost. There are ongoing detonations.” A construction worker employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk noted he had returned to Ukraine and enlisted to fight days before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in early 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been hit in the upper body. He groaned as doctors placed him on a medical cot, took off a bloody bandage and treated his recent injury from fragments. Covered in a foil blanket, he borrowed a mobile phone to ring his family member. “A fragment of artillery hit me. The cause was a deflected projectile. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. This may require a few months. Subsequently, to return to my unit. Someone has to protect our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors care for Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the dorsal area by a fragment of mortar.

Since 2022, Russia has repeatedly targeted hospitals, health facilities, obstetric units and ambulances. Per international monitors, 261 health workers have been fatally attacked in nearly 2,000 assaults. The underground facility is constructed from multiple reinforced shelters, with timber beams, soil and sand placed above up to ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even multiple eight-kilogram TNT charges released by aerial means.

A major steel and mining company, which financed the building, plans to erect 20 units in total. A senior official of Ukraine’s national security council and former military leader, the official, declared they would be “critically important for preserving the lives of our armed forces and supporting troops on the battlefront.” The company referred to the initiative as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had undertaken after Russia’s invasion.

An example of the centre’s operating theatres.

Holovashchenko, said some wounded soldiers had to wait hours or even days before they could be evacuated because of the threat of air assaults. “We had two severely injured patients who came at the early hours. I had to carry out a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's bleeding control device had been applied for so long there was no alternative.” What is his method with traumatic surgeries? “I’ve been healthcare for two decades. One must focus,” he remarked.

Orderlies transported the soldier up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The transport was parked under a shrub. He and the two other soldiers were transferred to the city of a major city for further treatment. The subterranean medical team took a break. The facility's orange feline, the mascot, walked up to the entrance to await the next arrivals. “Our facility operates open 24 hours a day,” the surgeon said. “The work is continuous.”