🔗 Share this article

Sparse foliage hide the entrance. A descending wooden tunnel leads down to a well-illuminated reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with gurneys, heart rate sensors and breathing machines. Plus shelves stocked of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. Within a break area with a washing machine and kettle, doctors keep an eye on a screen. It shows the flight patterns of enemy surveillance UAVs as they zigzag in the sky above.

Medical personnel at an underground medical center observe a monitor showing enemy kamikaze and surveillance drones in the region.

Welcome to the nation's covert below-ground hospital. This center began operations in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, situated in the eastern part of the country not far from the combat zone and the city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “We are six meters under the ground. This is the most secure method of delivering care to our wounded soldiers. And it keeps healthcare workers protected,” said the clinic’s lead doctor, Major the chief surgeon.

This medical station treats 30-40 casualties a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from devastating limb trauma necessitating surgical removal, or severe abdominal injuries. Some patients can move on their own. The vast majority are the victims of Russian FPV drones, which drop explosives with deadly accuracy. “90% of our patients are from FPVs. We see minimal bullet injuries. It’s an age of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor said.

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

During one afternoon recently, three soldiers limped into the facility. The most lightly injured, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, said an FPV blast had ripped a minor wound in his leg. “War is terrible. My comrade beside me, Vasyl, was killed,” he stated. “He collapsed. Then the enemy forces dropped a second explosive on him.” He added: “Everything in the village is destroyed. There are UAVs everywhere and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

The soldier said his squad spent over a month in a forest area near the city, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture since last year. The only way to get to their position was on foot. All supplies arrived by quadcopter: rations and drinking water. Seven days following he was hurt, he walked 5km (roughly three miles), requiring three hours, to a point where an military transport was able to pick him up. At the clinic, a medical staff assessed his physical condition. After treatment, a medical attendant provided him with new civilian clothes: a shirt and a pair of pale jeans.

Artem Dvorskiy, twenty-eight, said a FPV aerial device ripped a minor injury in his lower limb.

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, recounted a drone blast had left him with concussion. “My position was in a trench shelter. Suddenly it went dark. I lost sensation any feeling or any sound,” he explained. “I think I was fortunate to survive. A relative has been lost. We face continuous detonations.” A construction worker employed in Lithuania, Filipchuk said he had returned to his homeland and enlisted to fight days before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Another military member, a serviceman, had been hit in the upper body. He expressed pain as medical staff placed him on a medical cot, took off a stained bandage and cleaned his recent injury from fragments. Wrapped in a foil blanket, he used a cellphone to ring his sister. “A piece of mortar hit me. The cause was a deflected projectile. My condition is stable,” he told her. What were his plans now? “To get better. This may require a several months. After that, to go back to my military group. Someone has to defend our nation,” he said.

Medical staff care for the wounded soldier, who was injured in the dorsal area by a piece of artillery shell.

Over the past years, Russia has consistently attacked hospitals, health facilities, obstetric units and emergency vehicles. Per international monitors, over two hundred medical personnel have been killed in almost 2,000 attacks. This subterranean hospital is built from four reinforced shelters, with timber beams, soil and granular material placed above up to the surface. It can withstand impacts from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple eight-kilogram TNT charges released by drone.

The Ukrainian steel and mining company, which funded the construction, plans to build 20 facilities in total. A senior official of Ukraine’s national security council and former defence minister, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “vitally important for preserving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the battlefront.” The company referred to the project as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had implemented after the enemy's invasion.

An example of the centre’s surgical rooms.

Holovashchenko, explained some injured soldiers had to endure delays many hours or even days before they could be transported due to the threat of aerial attacks. “Our facility received a pair of severely injured patients who came at 3am. It was necessary to perform a double amputation 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 severe operations? “My career in medicine for 20 years. One must focus,” he remarked.

Orderlies wheeled the soldier through the passage and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed under a shrub. He and the other military members were transferred to the urban center of Dnipro for additional medical care. The underground hospital staff took a break. The facility's orange feline, Vasilevs, padded toward the doorway to greet the next arrivals. “Our facility operates active around the clock,” the surgeon said. “The work is continuous.”