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Scrubby trees conceal the entrance. A descending timber tunnel leads down to a well-illuminated welcome zone. There is a operating ward, equipped with beds, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. And shelves full of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. In a break area with a washing machine and kettle, doctors keep an eye on a screen. The screen reveals the flight patterns of Russian spy drones as they weave in the sky above.

Medical personnel at an subterranean hospital look at a screen displaying enemy suicide and reconnaissance UAVs in the area.

Welcome to the nation's secret below-ground hospital. The facility began operations in the eighth month and is the second such installation, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the combat zone and the city of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits 6 metres below the earth. It’s the safest way of providing help to our wounded military personnel. And it keeps medical personnel protected,” stated the clinic’s surgeon, Major the chief surgeon.

The stabilisation point handles thirty to forty patients a each day. Their conditions vary. Some have devastating limb trauma requiring surgical removal, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can move on their own. The vast majority are the victims of Russian FPV aerial devices, which drop explosives with lethal accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from first-person view drones. We encounter few bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the surgeon said.

Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko at the underground installation for caring for injured soldiers in the eastern region.

On one day last week, a group of three soldiers walked with difficulty into the facility. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old one soldier, reported an FPV explosion had ripped a small hole in his leg. “Conflict is horrific. My comrade beside me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He collapsed. Subsequently the Russians released a another grenade on him.” He continued: “Everything in the settlement is demolished. There are UAVs everywhere and bodies. Our side's and theirs.”

The soldier said his squad endured over a month in a forest area close to Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture since last year. Sole access to reach their position was on foot. All supplies arrived by drone: food and water. A week after he was hurt, he traveled five kilometers (roughly three miles), taking several hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic checked his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant gave him new civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a pair of light-colored jeans.

The soldier, 28, said a first-person view drone ripped a small hole in his leg.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, recounted a drone blast had left him with a head injury. “I was in a trench shelter. It suddenly went dark. I couldn’t feel anything or hear anything,” he explained. “I believe I was lucky to survive. My cousin has been lost. There are continuous detonations.” A construction worker employed in Lithuania, he said he had returned to Ukraine and volunteered to fight days before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in early 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been struck in the upper body. He groaned as doctors placed him on a bed, took off a stained dressing and treated his two-day-old injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he used a mobile phone to ring his family member. “A fragment of artillery struck me. It was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. That will take a few months. Subsequently, to return to my unit. Our forces must defend our country,” he said.

Medical staff treat the wounded soldier, who was injured in the back by a piece of mortar.

Since 2022, enemy forces has repeatedly targeted hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards and ambulances. According to international monitors, 261 medical personnel have been fatally attacked in almost 2,000 assaults. The underground facility is constructed from four steel bunkers, with timber beams, earth and sand laid on top reaching ground level. It can withstand impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even multiple 8kg explosive devices released by aerial means.

The Ukrainian industrial group, which funded the construction, plans to build 20 units in total. The head of Ukraine’s security agency and former defence minister, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “critically important for preserving the survival of our armed forces and assisting defenders on the frontline.” The organization described the initiative as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had undertaken since the enemy's invasion.

An example of the centre’s operating theatres.

The surgeon, said some wounded soldiers had to endure delays hours or even days before they could be transported due to the threat of air assaults. “We had a pair of severely injured patients who arrived at 3am. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's tourniquet had been applied for such an extended period there was no alternative.” How did he cope with severe surgeries? “My career in healthcare for 20 years. One must concentrate,” he remarked.

Medical assistants transported the soldier up the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The transport was parked under a shrub. The patient and the other soldiers were transferred to the urban center of Dnipro for further treatment. The subterranean hospital staff took a break. The facility's ginger cat, the mascot, padded toward the doorway to greet the next arrivals. “We are active 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko stated. “The work is continuous.”