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Scrubby trees hide the entrance. A descending timber tunnel descends to a brightly lit welcome zone. There is a operating ward, equipped with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. And cabinets stocked of medical equipment, drugs and neat piles of spare clothes. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, physicians keep an eye on a screen. It shows the movements of enemy spy drones as they weave in the air above.

Hospital personnel at an subterranean medical center look at a screen showing Russian kamikaze and reconnaissance UAVs in the area.

This is the nation's covert underground medical facility. This center began operations in August and is the second of its kind, located in eastern Ukraine not far from the combat zone and the urban area of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “We are six meters below the earth. This is the safest way of delivering care to our injured military personnel. And it keeps medical personnel protected,” said the facility's lead doctor, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station treats thirty to forty patients a each day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from devastating leg injuries requiring surgical removal, or severe abdominal injuries. Some patients can walk. The vast majority are the casualties of enemy FPV aerial devices, which drop grenades with lethal precision. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from first-person view drones. We see few gunshot wounds. This is an era of drones and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

Maj the senior surgeon at the subterranean facility for treating injured soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

On one day recently, three soldiers walked with difficulty into the facility. The most lightly injured, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, said an first-person view drone explosion had ripped a small hole in his limb. “Conflict is terrible. My comrade next to me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Subsequently the enemy forces dropped a another grenade on him.” He continued: “All structures in the settlement is destroyed. We see UAVs everywhere and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

The soldier explained his squad spent over a month in a wooded zone close to Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been trying to seize since last year. Sole access to get to their location was by walking. Necessary provisions came by drone: food and water. A week following he was injured, he traveled 5km (roughly three miles), requiring three hours, to where an military transport was able to pick him up. 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 denim trousers.

The soldier, 28, stated a first-person view drone ripped a small hole in his lower limb.

A different casualty, thirty-eight-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, recounted a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “My position was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it went dark. I couldn’t feel any feeling or any sound,” he said. “I believe I was fortunate to survive. My cousin has been lost. We face ongoing detonations.” A builder employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk noted he had come back to his homeland and volunteered to serve days before the Russian leader's large-scale attack in early 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been hit in the back. He groaned as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained bandage and cleaned his recent injury from fragments. Covered in a thermal sheet, he used a mobile phone to ring his family member. “A fragment of artillery hit me. It was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he informed her. What comes next for him? “To recover. This may require a few months. Subsequently, to return to my unit. Someone has to defend our country,” he affirmed.

Doctors care for Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the dorsal area by a fragment of mortar.

Over the past years, enemy forces has consistently targeted hospitals, health facilities, maternity wards and ambulances. Per human rights groups, over two hundred health workers have been killed in almost two thousand attacks. This subterranean hospital is constructed from multiple steel bunkers, with timber beams, soil and granular material laid on top reaching ground level. It can withstand direct hits from 152mm projectiles and even multiple 8kg TNT charges dropped 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 military leader, Rustem Umerov, said they would be “vitally important for preserving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the battlefront.” The company referred to the initiative as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had implemented after the enemy's invasion.

One of the facility's surgical rooms.

The surgeon, explained some injured soldiers had to endure delays hours or even multiple days before they could be transported due to the threat of air assaults. “We had a pair of critically ill casualties who arrived at 3am. I had 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 traumatic surgeries? “I’ve been healthcare for 20 years. One must concentrate,” he remarked.

Orderlies transported Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an ambulance. The vehicle was parked under a bush. The patient and the two other soldiers were taken to the city of a major city for additional medical care. The underground medical team paused for rest. The facility's ginger cat, Vasilevs, walked toward the doorway to greet the next arrivals. “Our facility operates open around the clock,” the surgeon stated. “The work is continuous.”