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Sparse trees conceal the entryway. One sloping wooden tunnel descends to a brightly lit welcome zone. There is a surgery unit, equipped with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. And shelves stocked of medical equipment, drugs and organized stacks of extra garments. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, physicians monitor a screen. It shows the movements of Russian surveillance UAVs as they weave in the air above.

Medical staff at an subterranean hospital observe a screen showing Russian kamikaze and surveillance drones in the area.

This is Ukraine’s covert underground hospital. The facility opened in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, located in the eastern part of the country close to the combat zone and the urban area of a key location in the Donetsk region. “Our facility sits six meters under the earth. It’s the most secure way of delivering care to our injured military personnel. It also ensures medical personnel protected,” stated the facility's surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station handles 30-40 patients a each day. Cases differ widely. Some have devastating leg injuries requiring surgical removal, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. Almost all are the victims of Russian first-person view (FPV) drones, which release grenades with lethal accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from first-person view drones. We see minimal gunshot wounds. This is an age of drones and a different kind of war,” the surgeon explained.

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

During one afternoon recently, three soldiers walked with difficulty into the hospital. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, reported an FPV explosion had ripped a minor wound in his leg. “Conflict is horrific. My comrade next to me, Vasyl, was killed,” he said. “He collapsed. Then the Russians dropped a second grenade on him.” He added: “Everything in the settlement is destroyed. We see UAVs everywhere and bodies. Ours and theirs.”

The soldier explained his unit endured 43 days in a wooded zone close to Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been trying to seize since last year. The only way to get to their position was on foot. All supplies came by quadcopter: food and drinking water. Seven days following he was injured, he walked five kilometers (about 3 miles), requiring several hours, to a point where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic assessed his vital signs. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with new non-military attire: a shirt and a set of pale jeans.

The soldier, 28, said a FPV aerial device caused a minor injury in his leg.

A different casualty, 38-year-old a serviceman, said a drone blast had left him with concussion. “My position was in a trench shelter. It suddenly became black. I couldn’t feel any feeling or any sound,” he said. “I think I was lucky to remain alive. A relative has been killed. There are ongoing detonations.” A builder employed in a neighboring country, he said he had come back to his homeland and volunteered to serve shortly before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in early 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the back. He expressed pain as doctors laid him on a medical cot, removed a stained dressing and cleaned his two-day-old injury from fragments. Covered in a foil blanket, he borrowed a mobile phone to ring his sister. “A piece of artillery struck me. It was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To recover. That will take a several months. After that, to go back to my military group. Someone has to protect our nation,” he affirmed.

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

Since 2022, Russia has consistently attacked hospitals, clinics, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. According to human rights groups, 261 medical personnel have been fatally attacked in almost 2,000 attacks. This subterranean hospital is built from multiple reinforced shelters, with wooden supports, soil and granular material laid on top reaching ground level. It is designed to resist impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even three eight-kilogram explosive devices dropped by aerial means.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which financed the construction, plans to build 20 facilities in total. A senior official of the nation's national security council and ex- military leader, the official, declared they would be “critically essential for saving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the frontline.” The organization described the initiative as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had implemented since the enemy's invasion.

One of the facility's operating theatres.

Holovashchenko, said certain injured personnel had to wait hours or even multiple days before they could be transported due to the threat of air assaults. “We had a pair of critically ill patients who came at the early hours. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's tourniquet had been on for so long there was no alternative.” What is his method with severe operations? “My career in healthcare for two decades. You have to concentrate,” he remarked.

Orderlies wheeled Mykolaichuk up the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The transport was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the other soldiers were taken to the city of Dnipro for additional medical care. The subterranean medical team paused for rest. The hospital’s orange feline, Vasilevs, padded up to the entrance to await the next arrivals. “Our facility operates active 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”