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Scrubby trees conceal the entrance. One sloping wooden tunnel descends to a well-illuminated reception area. Inside lies a surgery unit, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and ventilators. Plus shelves full of healthcare supplies, drugs and neat piles of spare clothes. In a break area with a washing machine and hot water heater, physicians monitor a display. It shows the movements of enemy surveillance UAVs as they weave in the air above.

Medical personnel at an underground medical center observe a monitor displaying Russian suicide and reconnaissance drones in the area.

Welcome to Ukraine’s secret underground hospital. This center began operations in August and is the second such installation, located in eastern Ukraine not far from the frontline and the city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region. “Our facility sits six meters below the ground. It’s the safest method of delivering care to our injured soldiers. It also ensures healthcare workers safe,” said the facility's lead doctor, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point treats 30-40 patients a day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic limb trauma requiring amputations, or serious stomach wounds. Others can walk. Almost all are the casualties of Russian FPV aerial devices, which drop explosives with lethal accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from first-person view drones. We see few gunshot wounds. It’s an era of drones and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

Maj the senior surgeon at the underground facility for treating wounded troops in eastern Ukraine.

On one day last week, a group of three military members walked with difficulty into the hospital. The most lightly injured, 28-year-old one soldier, said an FPV explosion had torn a small hole in his leg. “War is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was killed,” he stated. “He collapsed. Subsequently the Russians dropped a another grenade on him.” He continued: “All structures in the settlement is destroyed. We see drones all around and casualties. Ours and theirs.”

Dvorskyi said his unit spent over a month in a forest area close to the city, which enemy forces has been trying to seize for many months. The only way to reach their position was by walking. All supplies came by quadcopter: rations and water. A week following he was hurt, he walked 5km (roughly three miles), requiring several hours, to a point where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medical staff checked his physical condition. Following care, a nurse provided him with new civilian clothes: a shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

Artem Dvorskiy, 28, stated a first-person view drone caused a small hole in his leg.

Another patient, 38-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, said a drone blast had left him with concussion. “I was in a trench shelter. It suddenly became black. I couldn’t feel any feeling or hear anything,” he said. “I believe I was lucky to survive. A relative has been killed. There are continuous detonations.” A builder employed in Lithuania, he noted he had come back to Ukraine and enlisted to fight shortly before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in February 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been struck in the upper body. He expressed pain as medical staff placed him on a bed, took off a bloody bandage 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 artillery struck me. The cause was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. This may require a several months. After that, to return to my unit. Our forces must protect our country,” he said.

Doctors care for the wounded soldier, who was injured in the dorsal area by a piece of mortar.

Over the past years, Russia has consistently targeted hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards 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 multiple steel bunkers, with timber beams, soil and sand laid on top reaching ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from large-caliber projectiles and even three eight-kilogram TNT charges released by drone.

A major steel and mining company, which funded the building, plans to erect twenty units in total. The head of the nation's national security council and former defence minister, the official, declared they would be “critically important for saving the lives of our military and supporting troops on the battlefront.” The organization referred to the project as the “largest-scale and challenging” it had implemented since Russia’s military offensive.

One of the centre’s operating theatres.

Holovashchenko, explained some injured personnel had to wait hours or even days before they could be transported due to the threat of air assaults. “We had two critically ill casualties who came at the early hours. I had to perform a double amputation on one of them. The soldier's tourniquet had been applied for so long there was no other option.” How did he cope with severe operations? “I’ve been medicine for 20 years. One must concentrate,” he remarked.

Orderlies wheeled Mykolaichuk up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was parked beneath a bush. He and the two other military members were transferred to the city of Dnipro for further treatment. The subterranean hospital staff paused for rest. The facility's ginger cat, the mascot, padded toward the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates open 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”