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Scrubby foliage conceal the entryway. A sloping wooden passageway descends to a well-illuminated reception area. There is a operating ward, equipped with beds, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. Plus cabinets stocked of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. Within a break area with a washing machine and kettle, physicians monitor a screen. It shows the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they zigzag in the sky above.

Hospital personnel at an subterranean medical center look at a monitor showing enemy suicide and reconnaissance drones in the area.

This is Ukraine’s covert below-ground medical facility. This center opened in August and is the second of its kind, situated in eastern Ukraine close to the frontline and the urban area of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “We are 6 metres below the ground. It’s the safest way of providing help to our wounded military personnel. It also ensures medical personnel protected,” said the facility's surgeon, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point treats 30-40 patients a each day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic leg injuries requiring amputations, or serious abdominal injuries. Some patients can move on their own. Almost all are the victims of enemy FPV drones, which drop grenades with deadly precision. “90% of our cases are from FPVs. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a new type of conflict,” the doctor said.

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

During one afternoon last week, three military members limped into the facility. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, reported an FPV explosion had torn a small hole in his limb. “War is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was killed,” he said. “He fell down. Subsequently the Russians released a another grenade on him.” He added: “All structures in the settlement is destroyed. There are UAVs all around and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi explained his squad endured 43 days in a forest area near Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to reach their location was by walking. Necessary provisions arrived by quadcopter: food and water. A week after he was injured, he walked 5km (roughly three miles), requiring several hours, to where an military transport was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medic assessed his physical condition. After treatment, a medical attendant provided him with new civilian clothes: a shirt and a pair of pale jeans.

The soldier, 28, stated a first-person view aerial device caused a minor injury in his leg.

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, said a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “I was in a dugout. Suddenly it became black. I couldn’t feel any feeling or hear anything,” he said. “I think I was fortunate to survive. My cousin has been lost. There are continuous explosions.” A construction worker employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk said he had come back to Ukraine and enlisted to serve shortly before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in early 2022.

A third soldier, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the upper body. He expressed pain as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained dressing and cleaned his recent injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he borrowed a cellphone to ring his family member. “A piece of artillery struck me. It was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To recover. This may require a several months. Subsequently, to go back to my unit. Someone must protect our nation,” he affirmed.

Doctors treat the wounded soldier, who was injured in the dorsal area by a fragment of mortar.

Since 2022, Russia has repeatedly attacked hospitals, clinics, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. According to human rights groups, 261 health workers have been fatally attacked in nearly two thousand attacks. This subterranean hospital is built from multiple reinforced shelters, with timber beams, earth and sand placed above up to the surface. It is designed to resist impacts from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple 8kg TNT charges dropped by drone.

A major industrial group, which financed the building, intends to build 20 facilities in total. The head of the nation's national security council and ex- military leader, the official, said they would be “vitally important for saving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the battlefront.” The company described the initiative as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had implemented since the enemy's military offensive.

One of the centre’s surgical rooms.

The surgeon, said some wounded soldiers had to endure delays hours or even multiple days before they could be transported due to the threat of aerial attacks. “We had a pair of critically ill patients who came at 3am. It was necessary to perform a removal of both limbs on a patient. His tourniquet had been on for such an extended period there was no other option.” What is his method with severe surgeries? “My career in healthcare for two decades. You have to focus,” he remarked.

Orderlies wheeled the soldier up the passage and into an ambulance. The vehicle was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the two other soldiers were transferred to the urban center of Dnipro for additional medical care. The subterranean hospital staff paused for rest. The facility's orange feline, Vasilevs, walked toward the doorway to greet the next arrivals. “We are active around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “The work is continuous.”