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Scrubby trees hide the entrance. One descending wooden tunnel descends to a well-illuminated welcome zone. Inside lies a operating ward, equipped with gurneys, cardiac monitors and ventilators. Plus shelves stocked of medical equipment, drugs and organized stacks of extra garments. In a staff room with a washing machine and hot water heater, doctors keep an eye on a screen. The screen reveals the flight patterns of Russian spy drones as they weave in the sky above.

Hospital staff at an underground medical center look at a screen displaying enemy suicide and surveillance drones in the area.

Welcome to Ukraine’s secret underground medical facility. The facility began operations in August and is the second such installation, situated in eastern Ukraine not far from the frontline and the urban area of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region. “We are 6 metres under the earth. This is the safest method of delivering care to our wounded military personnel. And it keeps healthcare workers safe,” stated the clinic’s surgeon, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station handles 30-40 casualties a day. Their conditions vary. Certain individuals suffer from devastating limb trauma requiring amputations, or serious stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. Almost all are the victims of Russian FPV drones, which release grenades with deadly precision. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from FPVs. We encounter minimal bullet injuries. It’s an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the surgeon explained.

Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko at the subterranean facility for treating wounded troops in eastern Ukraine.

On one afternoon recently, a group of three soldiers limped into the hospital. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, said an FPV explosion had torn a small hole in his limb. “War is horrific. The guy beside me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He fell down. Then the Russians released a another grenade on him.” He continued: “Everything in the settlement is destroyed. There are drones everywhere and bodies. Ours and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi said his squad endured over a month in a forest area near the city, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to get to their position was on foot. Necessary provisions arrived by drone: food and drinking water. Seven days following he was hurt, he walked five kilometers (roughly three miles), requiring several hours, to a point where an military transport was able to evacuate him. At the clinic, a medical staff assessed his vital signs. Following care, a nurse provided him with fresh civilian clothes: a shirt and a set of light-colored denim trousers.

The soldier, twenty-eight, said a FPV drone caused a small hole in his leg.

Another patient, 38-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, recounted a UAV explosion had resulted in a head injury. “My position was in a trench shelter. It suddenly went dark. I lost sensation any feeling or any sound,” he said. “I think I was lucky to remain alive. A relative has been lost. We face continuous explosions.” A builder employed in Lithuania, he said he had returned to Ukraine and volunteered to serve days before the Russian leader's large-scale attack in February 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been struck in the back. He expressed pain as medical staff placed him on a bed, removed a stained dressing and cleaned his two-day-old injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to call his family member. “A piece of artillery hit me. The cause was a ricochet. My condition is stable,” he informed her. What comes next for him? “To get better. That will take a several months. After that, to go back to my military group. Someone must protect our nation,” he said.

Medical staff treat the wounded soldier, who was injured in the dorsal area by a fragment of artillery shell.

Since 2022, Russia has repeatedly targeted hospitals, health facilities, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. Per international monitors, 261 health workers have been killed in nearly 2,000 attacks. The underground facility is built from multiple steel bunkers, with wooden supports, soil and sand laid on top up to the surface. It can withstand direct hits from large-caliber projectiles and even three eight-kilogram TNT charges released by drone.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which financed the construction, intends to erect 20 facilities in all. A senior official of the nation's national security council and ex- military leader, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “vitally important for saving the lives of our armed forces and assisting troops on the battlefront.” The organization referred to the project as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had undertaken after Russia’s invasion.

One of the facility's operating theatres.

Holovashchenko, said some wounded soldiers had to wait many hours or even days before they could be transported due to the danger of aerial attacks. “We had a pair of severely injured patients who arrived at 3am. I had to carry out a removal of both limbs on one of them. His tourniquet had been applied for such an extended period there was no alternative.” What is his method with severe operations? “I’ve been healthcare for two decades. You have to concentrate,” he said.

Orderlies wheeled Mykolaichuk up the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed under a bush. He and the two other military members were taken to the city of a major city for additional medical care. The subterranean medical team took a break. The facility's orange feline, Vasilevs, padded up to the doorway to await the next arrivals. “We are active around the clock,” Holovashchenko stated. “It doesn’t stop.”