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Scrubby foliage conceal the entryway. One descending timber tunnel descends to a well-illuminated welcome zone. There is a operating ward, outfitted with beds, heart rate sensors and breathing machines. Plus cabinets stocked of medical equipment, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. In a break area with a laundry appliance and hot water heater, physicians keep an eye on a display. It shows the movements of Russian spy drones as they zigzag in the air above.

Medical staff at an subterranean hospital look at a screen showing Russian kamikaze and reconnaissance drones in the region.

This is the nation's covert below-ground hospital. The facility opened in the eighth month 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. “Our facility sits six meters under the ground. This is the most secure way of delivering care to our wounded soldiers. And it keeps healthcare workers protected,” stated the facility's lead doctor, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station handles thirty to forty patients a day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from devastating limb trauma necessitating amputations, or serious stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. Almost all are the casualties of Russian first-person view (FPV) aerial devices, which drop explosives with deadly accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from FPVs. We see minimal gunshot wounds. This is an age of drones and a new type of conflict,” the surgeon explained.

Major the senior surgeon at the underground installation for caring for wounded troops in the eastern region.

During one day last week, a group of three military members walked with difficulty into the facility. The least severely hurt, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, reported an FPV explosion had torn a minor wound in his leg. “Conflict is terrible. My comrade beside me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Then the enemy forces dropped a another explosive on him.” He added: “All structures in the settlement is demolished. We see UAVs everywhere and casualties. Ours and theirs.”

Dvorskyi said his squad spent over a month in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which Russia has been trying to seize since last year. Sole access to reach their position was by walking. All supplies arrived by quadcopter: food and water. A week following he was injured, he walked five kilometers (roughly three miles), taking three hours, to where an military transport was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medical staff assessed his physical condition. Following care, a nurse provided him with new non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

Artem Dvorskiy, twenty-eight, stated a FPV aerial device ripped a small hole in his leg.

A different casualty, thirty-eight-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, recounted a drone blast had resulted in a head injury. “I was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it became black. I lost sensation any feeling or any sound,” he explained. “I believe I was lucky to remain alive. My cousin has been killed. We face ongoing explosions.” A construction worker working in Lithuania, Filipchuk noted he had returned to his homeland and enlisted to fight shortly before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been struck in the upper body. He groaned as medical staff laid him on a bed, took off a bloody bandage and treated his recent injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to call his sister. “A piece of artillery hit me. The cause was a ricochet. I’m OK,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. That will take a several months. After that, to return to my unit. Someone must protect our nation,” he affirmed.

Doctors treat Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the back by a piece of mortar.

Since 2022, enemy forces has repeatedly attacked medical centers, health facilities, obstetric units and ambulances. Per international monitors, 261 medical personnel have been killed in nearly two thousand attacks. The underground facility is constructed from four steel bunkers, with wooden supports, earth and sand laid on top up to ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from large-caliber artillery shells and even three eight-kilogram explosive devices released by aerial means.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which financed the construction, plans to build 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 preserving the survival of our military and supporting troops on the battlefront.” The company described the project as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had implemented after the enemy's military offensive.

An example of the facility's surgical rooms.

Holovashchenko, said certain injured soldiers had to wait many hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated due to the danger of air assaults. “We had a pair of severely injured casualties who came at the early hours. It was necessary to perform a removal of both limbs on one of them. The soldier's tourniquet had been applied for such an extended period there was no other option.” What is his method with severe operations? “I’ve been medicine for two decades. One must concentrate,” he remarked.

Medical assistants transported the soldier through the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the two other military members were taken to the city of a major city for further treatment. The underground medical team paused for rest. The hospital’s orange feline, Vasilevs, walked up to the entrance to greet the next arrivals. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”