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Sparse foliage hide the entrance. A sloping timber tunnel leads down to a brightly lit reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. And shelves full of healthcare supplies, medications and neat piles of spare clothes. In a break area with a washing machine and kettle, doctors monitor a display. The screen reveals the flight patterns of Russian surveillance UAVs as they weave in the air above.

Hospital personnel at an subterranean hospital observe a monitor displaying enemy suicide and reconnaissance drones in the area.

This is Ukraine’s secret underground hospital. The facility opened in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, located in the eastern part of the country not far from the combat zone and the city of a key location in the Donetsk region. “We are 6 metres under the ground. It’s the safest method of providing help to our injured military personnel. And it keeps medical personnel safe,” said the facility's lead doctor, Maj the chief surgeon.

The stabilisation point handles 30-40 casualties a each day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic leg injuries requiring amputations, or severe abdominal injuries. Others can walk. The vast majority are the victims of enemy FPV aerial devices, which release explosives with deadly precision. “90% of our cases are from FPVs. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. It’s an era of drones and a new type of conflict,” the doctor explained.

Major the senior surgeon at the subterranean installation for caring for injured troops in eastern Ukraine.

During one afternoon last week, a group of three soldiers limped into the facility. The most lightly injured, 28-year-old one soldier, said an FPV explosion had ripped a minor wound in his limb. “Conflict is horrific. The guy beside me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He collapsed. Then the enemy forces released a second grenade on him.” He added: “Everything in the village is demolished. There are UAVs everywhere and bodies. Ours and theirs.”

Dvorskyi said his unit spent over a month in a wooded zone close to Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to get to their location was on foot. Necessary provisions arrived by drone: rations and drinking water. Seven days after he was injured, he traveled five kilometers (roughly three miles), requiring three hours, to a point where an military transport was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medical staff checked his vital signs. After treatment, a medical attendant provided him with fresh non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

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

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, recounted a drone blast had left him with concussion. “I was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it went dark. I lost sensation anything or any sound,” he explained. “I believe I was lucky to survive. A relative has been lost. There are ongoing detonations.” A construction worker working in Lithuania, he noted he had come back to his homeland and enlisted to fight days before the Russian leader's large-scale attack in early 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been struck in the back. He groaned as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a bloody dressing and treated his two-day-old injury from fragments. Covered in a foil blanket, he used a mobile phone to call his sister. “A piece of mortar hit me. It was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. That will take a few months. After that, to go back to my unit. Someone has to defend our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors treat the wounded soldier, who was hit in the back by a piece of mortar.

Since 2022, enemy forces has consistently attacked hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. Per international monitors, over two hundred health workers have been killed in almost two thousand assaults. The underground facility is constructed from four steel bunkers, with wooden supports, earth and granular material placed above up to the surface. It can withstand impacts from 152mm artillery shells and even multiple 8kg explosive devices released by aerial means.

A major steel and mining company, which financed the building, intends to build twenty units in all. The head of the nation's security agency and ex- defence minister, the official, said they would be “critically essential for preserving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the frontline.” The organization referred to the project as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had undertaken after Russia’s invasion.

An example of the centre’s surgical rooms.

The surgeon, said certain injured personnel had to endure delays many hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated because of the danger of air assaults. “Our facility received two severely injured patients who arrived at 3am. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on a patient. The soldier's bleeding control device had been applied for so long there was no alternative.” How did he cope with severe operations? “I’ve been medicine for 20 years. You have to concentrate,” he remarked.

Medical assistants transported the soldier up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed beneath a bush. He and the two other soldiers were taken to the city of a major city for additional medical care. The subterranean hospital staff took a break. The facility's ginger cat, Vasilevs, padded up to the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”