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Scrubby foliage hide the entryway. One sloping timber tunnel descends to a well-illuminated reception area. Inside lies a operating ward, equipped with beds, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. Plus shelves stocked of healthcare supplies, drugs and organized stacks of spare clothes. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, doctors keep an eye on a display. The screen reveals the movements of enemy surveillance UAVs as they zigzag in the air above.

Medical staff at an underground medical center observe a monitor showing Russian suicide and reconnaissance drones in the area.

This is the nation's covert below-ground medical facility. The facility opened in the eighth month and is the second such installation, situated in the eastern part of the country close to the combat zone and the urban area of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “We are six meters below the earth. It’s the safest method of delivering care to our wounded soldiers. And it keeps healthcare workers protected,” said the clinic’s lead doctor, Maj the chief surgeon.

The stabilisation point handles 30-40 patients a each day. Their conditions vary. Some have devastating limb trauma necessitating amputations, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. Almost all are the victims of enemy first-person view (FPV) drones, which drop explosives with lethal accuracy. “90% of our cases are from FPVs. We see minimal bullet injuries. This is an era of drones and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko at the underground facility for treating injured troops in the eastern region.

During one afternoon recently, three military members walked with difficulty into the hospital. The most lightly injured, 28-year-old Artem Dvorskyi, reported an FPV blast had ripped a minor wound in his limb. “War is horrific. My comrade beside me, a fellow soldier, was killed,” he said. “He collapsed. Subsequently the Russians released a second grenade on him.” He added: “Everything in the village is demolished. There are drones everywhere and casualties. Our side's and the enemy's.”

The soldier explained his squad endured over a month in a wooded zone close to Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to get to their location was by walking. Necessary provisions came by drone: food and drinking water. Seven days following he was injured, he walked five kilometers (roughly three miles), taking several hours, to where an military transport was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his vital signs. After treatment, a nurse provided him with fresh non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of light-colored denim trousers.

Artem Dvorskiy, 28, said a FPV drone caused a minor injury in his leg.

A different casualty, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, said a UAV explosion had left him with concussion. “My position was in a trench shelter. It suddenly went dark. I lost sensation anything or hear anything,” he said. “I think I was fortunate to survive. A relative has been killed. There are continuous detonations.” A builder employed in a neighboring country, Filipchuk said he had come back to his homeland and volunteered to fight shortly before Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion in early 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the upper body. He expressed pain as doctors placed him on a medical cot, took off a stained bandage and treated his recent injury from fragments. Covered in a thermal sheet, he used a cellphone to ring his sister. “A fragment of artillery struck me. It was a deflected projectile. My condition is stable,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To recover. This may require a few months. After that, to go back to my military group. Our forces has to defend our nation,” he said.

Medical staff treat Taras Mykolaichuk, who was hit in the dorsal area by a piece of mortar.

Since 2022, Russia has consistently targeted hospitals, clinics, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. According to international monitors, over two hundred health workers have been fatally attacked in almost two thousand assaults. This subterranean hospital is built from four reinforced shelters, with timber beams, earth and sand placed above up to ground level. It is designed to resist direct hits from 152mm artillery shells and even multiple 8kg TNT charges dropped by drone.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which funded the construction, plans to erect 20 facilities in all. A senior official of the nation's national security council and ex- military leader, the official, said they would be “critically essential for preserving the survival of our military and assisting troops on the battlefront.” The organization referred to the project as the “most ambitious and challenging” it had undertaken after Russia’s military offensive.

One of the centre’s operating theatres.

The surgeon, explained some wounded personnel had to endure delays hours or even days before they could be transported due to the danger of air assaults. “We had two severely injured patients who came at 3am. I had to carry out a double amputation on one of them. His tourniquet had been on for such an extended period there was no alternative.” How did he cope with traumatic operations? “I’ve been medicine for 20 years. You have to concentrate,” he said.

Medical assistants wheeled Mykolaichuk up the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed under a shrub. The patient and the other military members were transferred to the urban center of a major city for further treatment. The underground medical team paused for rest. The facility's ginger cat, the mascot, walked up to the doorway to greet the incoming patients. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” Holovashchenko said. “It doesn’t stop.”